Arrow II - Resolution
by RoseThistleLady
Summary: Several weeks on from the terror attack that almost destroyed Team Arrow, Starling City is starting to rebuild. But our heroes have little time to relax as a series of unexpected and violent events leads Oliver Queen and the team to suspect that there is an even greater danger on the horizon.


**Chapter One**

It was spring in Starling City. Downtown the trees in the gently manicured parks were starting to blossom, and office and shop workers began to venture out at lunchtime to sit in the early spring sunshine, still wrapped in their overcoats but eager to embrace the welcome change in the weather and the season. The very demeanour of the residents of Starling seemed to alter too, their bodies no longer hunched over against the biting winds and cold snow flurries, their faces pinched and skin raw. As the weather improved, people began to stand upright and turned their closed eyes to the sun to breathe in contentedly. The mood in the city seemed to change from its winter introspection, as if there was a collective agreement to think more positively. The days grew longer, the dark hours began to reduce, and the nights became less frosty.

At 02.00am on a weekday in early March however, the male portion of Team Arrow were not "feeling" the seasonal change quite yet and were still seeing their hot breath emerging in puffs of steam into the very cold early morning air.

The Arrow, dressed head to toe in dark green modified leather, slid down the high strength tensile polymer cable that he had fired from a jettisoning arrow from an adjacent building, and dropped into a crouch on the rooftop of a warehouse in the Glades.

"In position," said Oliver holding a gloved hand to his chest, and speaking into the communication device embedded in his jacket.

John Diggle, having parked Team Arrow's black van further up the alley from the warehouse, slipped in between some stacks of wooden pallets, his eyes scanning the shuttered corrugated rear entrance to the warehouse; a single halogen light above its door casting an faint glow against the metal. There was only one guard posted outside the rear entrance, but he was armed with an automatic rifle so any frontal assault would have to be done with stealth. Diggle reached behind him to grip hold of his Glock, sliding it out of his back holster. He'd never been one to carry a weapon under his armpit.

"In position, there's one guard," whispered Diggle, touching the Bluetooth device in his ear, which connected him with the rest of Team Arrow. He pulled the black balaclava he'd been wearing as a beanie, down over his face. It wasn't as dramatic as wearing a mask, like Oliver or Roy, but was a necessity in helping to disguise his appearance.

Roy Harper, dressed as Arsenal, in his dark red leather suit, his hood pulled forward and mask firmly in place across his eyes, stepped quickly and quietly along the alley adjacent to the front of the warehouse. Roy hugged the shadows at the side of the alley, gripping his bow, his free hand poised to rip an arrow from the quiver strapped across his back. At the end of the alley, he stepped out quickly to his right and hid behind a large metal dumpster. As Arsenal peeked around the edge of the dumpster he scanned the front of the warehouse.

"In position," said Roy into his Bluetooth device, "I've got three armed guards, and two trucks ready to be loaded."

Back at the Arrow cave, Felicity Smoak's eager eyes scanned all three computer monitors before her on the steel workbench she sat at. Her Bluetooth device active, she spoke out loud as if to herself in the room, communicating directly with her three friends out in the field. She kept her tone brisk and business-like, but inside, her nerves were jangling as they always did when a mission was in progress. She counted Oliver Queen, Roy Harper and John Diggle out of the Arrow cave an hour ago, silently wishing them good hunting, and she wouldn't relax until she had counted them all back safely.

"I've hacked into ARGUS satellite imagery over your area. The trucks are registered to a rental company in Central City," said Felicity, her fingers flying across her keyboard, hacking into the rental company database, "looks like a John Doe paid cash up front for their hire, the ID he used was fake, there's no trail on who hired them."

"Felicity we need a breakdown on what's inside the warehouse," said Oliver, stepping over to the edge of the warehouse roof, briefing looking down on the trucks below.

"There's no working CCTV inside. Thermal imagery is showing at least a dozen men on the ground floor, none on the upper two floors. No wait, it looks like there are two figures in the north east corner. One is moving, the other isn't," said Felicity staring at the blurred dots on her screen within the framework of the building, registering the activity inside the warehouse.

"Diggle, Roy, time to knock on the door," said Oliver, as he ran over to the roof top entrance to the warehouse. He gently prised open the metal door, and slipped into the dark stairwell, heading down, his bow gripped tightly in his hand, his senses alert for any movement.

Arsenal reached into his quiver for an arrow with an explosive tip and positioned it in his bow, stretching the bow string taut he breathed out, focussed his aim, and let the arrow loose. The resulting explosion knocked a hole in the side of the driver's cab of one of the trucks, sending a shower of sparks, metal shards, and glass across the slipway to the warehouse. The two guards nearest to the explosion were instantly knocked to the ground; the third started firing his automatic weapon in the direction of the dumpster where Roy had been hiding.

Having fired off his arrow, Roy had immediately started running towards the other truck, and upon reaching it, had placed a small explosive magnetic charge on its driver's side front wheel. Then racing towards the rear of the truck, Arsenal circled around the back of it, and loading another arrow, stretched the bow string and stood between the rear of both trucks as the second explosion went off. The two guards that had been on the floor staggered up and away from both trucks, heading back towards the warehouse, only to encounter a man in red leather aiming a bow at them. An arrow slammed into the upper shoulder of the guard on the right, who fell to the floor, writhing in agony before he passed out under the dispersed shot of tranquiliser in the arrow's head. The second guard brought his weapon up to fire at Arsenal, who quickly bore down on him, and through a short succession of punches and kicks sent the guard falling unconscious to the floor, his weapon scuttling across the concrete entrance slipway of the warehouse.

Roy ducked instinctively as automatic fire whizzed past his head, crawling under the truck to his right for shelter. Emerging the other side of the truck, Arsenal used his agility and strength to mount the side of the truck and stood on its roof, his bow loaded with another arrow, as he watched the third guard, creeping between the trucks below him. Roy let the arrow loose and saw the guard take the full power of the missile into the top of his right shoulder. A burst of gunfire shot out wildly from the guard's gun as he fell to the floor. Arsenal jumped down to the ground, walked over to the man and hit him across the face with his bow, knocking him out cold.

"Front door's open," said Arsenal as he fixed another arrow into his bow and crept towards the now undefended warehouse entrance.

At the same time that Roy had launched his one man assault at the front of the warehouse. Diggle had quietly and quickly manoeuvred himself in between the stacks of pallets piled up along the wall adjacent to the rear entrance of the warehouse. Keeping his eye on the guard patrolling outside at all times, Diggle finally came to within twenty feet of his target. John re-secured his pistol in the back holster attached to his belt.

Slipping a hand into the pocket of his leather jacket John took out an explosive arrow head, and primed it to detonate. Diggle threw the arrow head in the direction of the armed guard. The resulting explosion disorientated the guard long enough for John to approach him at speed and get in two swift punches before the guard attempted to defend himself. Diggle wrestled the machine gun out of the guard's hands and used it as a bludgeon, jabbing it into the man's midriff before swiping across the guards face. The man fell to the floor unconscious. Diggle hooked the strap of the automatic weapon across his torso, and reached for his holstered Glock again.

"Back door's open," said Diggle as he held his pistol ahead of him and walked over to the rear door of the warehouse. Depressing the button that opened the metal door, Diggle crouched to one side of the doorway as the cantilevered metal shutter rose to reveal the chaos beyond, triggered by Arsenal's assault on the front of the building.

Guns fired wildly and men ran around trying to find suitable and safe positions from which to hide from arrows being fired at them from the front of the building, and with the arrival of Oliver on the first level of the warehouse, from above. Diggle took a breath and then joined in the fray, adding to the chaos by attacking from the rear.

In the basement lair below Verdant nightclub, Felicity scanned everything. From CCTV in the area around the warehouse, to thermal imagery, from hacked satellites, to hacked radio frequencies, her keen eyes monitored every piece of information she could access in order to try and help her friends who were in mortal peril. Felicity picked up chatter from the SCPD who had received a report of gunfire in the area of the warehouse. A couple of patrol cars had been dispatched along with a senior detective. The fight at the warehouse would probably, and hopefully, be over by the time the SCPD arrived, but Oliver, Roy and Diggle would need time, or a distraction, in order to get safely away. Felicity started making plans to create a diversion if one was required.

Amidst the chaos and noise of the fight in the warehouse, Felicity's voice cut through to all of her Team Arrow colleagues.

"No pressure, but SCPD are on route to your location. You've probably got less than five minutes," said Felicity, "I'm sure that's more than enough time for you guys anyway".

Both struggling to battle their way through to each other from opposite ends of the warehouse, Diggle and Roy both paused between punches and rolled their eyes at Felicity's statement, and then started going hell for leather at the nearest thug to them. Up on level one of the building Oliver grinned a short, tight smile.

Oliver expertly scanned the action on the floor below him and fired off an explosive arrow a few yards to Roy's right where an armed thug had been concealed waiting an opportunity to attack. That was one less problem for Arsenal to worry about. Oliver could see that John and Roy were winning the battle, so he edged towards the north east corner of level one, where Felicity had identified two images on the thermal scan of the building.

An armed guard came out firing from the doorway at the end of the walkway on the upper level. Oliver ducked and shielded himself behind some metal containers to his left, positioning an arrow in his bow he threw himself out from behind the containers, and from the floor of the walkway, fired up at the armed thug. The arrow hit the attacker in his thigh, the pain from which sent him crashing down on one knee, his firing hand instantly grasping the shaft of the arrow sticking out of his leg. Oliver leapt to his feet and walked over to the injured man, and punched him twice swiftly across the side of his face, hoping to send him sprawling on the metal walkway. The armed attacker however had unexpected reserves of strength and threw an upper cut punch across Oliver's face, which split the corner of his lip, and followed this up with two heavy punches to Oliver's lower ribs as the thug rose to his feet again; Oliver reeled backwards on his heels from the combination of punches. Steadying himself again, Oliver gripped his bow and aimed it firstly in to the attackers stomach, and then across his face, which this time sent the man crashing back on to the metal floor of the walkway not to move again.

Oliver spat out some blood, and then strung another arrow, his bow string pulled half taut, ready for anything he would find beyond the doorway the armed guard had recently stepped through. As Oliver's eyes adjusted to the darkened room beyond, which was windowless, its walls made of concrete, he reduced the pull on his bowstring. In the far corner of the room a man was tied up and leaning against one of the walls. As Oliver slowly approached him he could see then man had been beaten around the face, and he was wearing a business suit. He'd been a captive for a few days judging by the state of his clothing and the beard growth on his face.

The man looked up at the hooded figure in leather holding a bow approaching him and stared in wide eyed wonder at the change in his fortunes; the Arrow had come to rescue him! Oliver reached down and used a sharp arrow head to cut the ties securing his arms and legs. Triggering the voice amplifier built into his jacket, the Arrow told the man he should remain where he was until it was safe, the SCPD were on their way and would come for him. The man nodded once, and watched transfixed as the Arrow walked out of the room, the sound of gunfire echoing up from the warehouse floor below.

Oliver ran along the metal walkway and down the flight of stairs leading to the ground floor. He made short work of fighting an armed thug who was attempting to make a rear assault on Diggle from behind a stack of wooden pallets. Arsenal took out another thug with a spinning roundhouse kick, and John used a handily placed plank of wood to knock out the guy he had been tussling with. As the last armed assailant went crashing to the floor courtesy of a volley of well-placed punches from the Arrow, the three men met each other in the centre of the warehouse amidst a scene of carnage, with bodies lying around the floor of the building, either groaning in agony or unconscious.

Sirens from the SCPD squad cars sent to investigate the sounds of reported gunfire could be heard approaching.

"Guys, SCPD are approaching your location," said Felicity into their earpieces as she scanned the police cars heading down the street nearest to the warehouse via the CCTV images she had hacked into.

"We can hear them. Time to go," said Oliver, as the three men started running towards the rear entrance of the building, and towards the black van parked further along the alleyway from the warehouse. Oliver and Roy jumped into the rear of the van, pulling the door shut, whilst Diggle leapt into the driver's seat, wrenching the balaclava off of his face. John gunned the engine to life and heel-palmed the steering wheel around 180 degrees, before depressing the accelerator, sending the van racing towards the end of the alleyway where it re-joined a main road heading towards central Starling.

Detective Sergeant Kate Burrows stepped out of the unmarked police car she had been driving, her vehicle flanked by three other marked SCPD squad cars. She reached behind her to her belt holster and withdrew her service revolver, cupping it firmly in both hands as she stepped cautiously towards the open doorway of the warehouse, two trucks parked out front, smouldering from what she assumed was targeted explosions. Fellow uniformed officers, their guns drawn, took up flanking positions either side of her. As she reached the doorway to the building and looked inside at the scene of carnage before her she reached into her SCPD patrol jacket pocket and took out her mobile phone, punching a number held on speed dial. The call connected almost instantly.

"Captain, it looks like the Arrow's had a busy night," said Burrows into the phone clamped to her ear.

Before Quentin Lance's reply could reach his Sergeant, she heard movement to her left, and immediately aimed her gun out before her, cupping both hands, one still holding the mobile phone, around the butt of the weapon.

A man staggered out of the shadows of the warehouse into view, his hands held up in surrendered defence as he realised that multiple guns were being aimed at him, as the officers nearest Burrows also moved up to aim their weapons at him.

"Is it safe to come out now?" said the man, his voice almost cracking with the effort of talking, his body limp and staggering to walk forwards.

Burrows looked head to toe at the man in his dishevelled state, and then looked at his face again, and realised she knew who he was. She re-positioned the mobile phone against her ear, to hear Lance loudly calling her name.

"Burrows, are you there, what's going on?!" said Captain Lance, concern in his voice.

"Sir, I think we may have a situation," said Burrows, "you are not going to believe who's just turned up."

Several weeks on from the chaos that had descended upon Starling City in the wake of the unknown terror organisation launching a co-ordinated assault on its streets, work was still progressing to try and rebuild and recover. In the wake of the destruction of the Markov crime syndicate by the SCPD, largely completed with the help of Team Arrow, new and complex crime connections had evolved across Starling, which the SCPD and Team Arrow were battling to understand as well as contain. The assault on the warehouse earlier had been one in a succession of these battles that had kept Oliver, Roy, John and Felicity busy for the past few weeks.

With the Markov criminal hierarchy either being processed in local SCPD detention centres or under lock and key in Iron Heights Prison, there had been a flurry of manoeuvring in the period following the attack on Starling as various local leaders of small crime gangs positioned themselves as prospective replacements for the gap left by Markov and his senior henchmen. Affiliations and gang allegiances were broken, and then re-formed as quickly, old enemies began working with each other, and open warfare existed amongst criminals in certain parts of the city, like the Glades, as "control" was taken by newly emerging gangs.

The SCPD, working alongside Special Agent Morgan from the national taskforce fighting organised crime, was struggling to stay in touch with the constantly evolving situation, whilst still taking the lead on battling everyday crime on a daily basis, and playing their part in the Mayor's newly launched campaign to "keep our city streets safe for the next generation". Captain Quentin Lance knew that the SCPD couldn't hope to cope alone with the current situation, even with the help of Agent Morgan's taskforce resources, and had been liaising with the Arrow's team over the last few weeks, via Felicity Smoak; a fact that he hadn't revealed to Agent Morgan, whose view of "the Vigilante", as she insisted on calling him, was unwavering in its hostility.

Federal Agent Morgan and her team, which had Sergeant Burrows from the SCPD seconded into it, were chasing down all available leads left behind from the attack on the city several weeks ago; but they didn't have a lot to go on. Whoever had been behind the co-ordinated assault on the city had done a good job in covering their tracks, and in covering the tracks of any of the operatives that they had employed; who for the most part had fled or died in the chaos of those winter days.

Morgan's team, along with the SCPD, had yet to identify any "Mr Big" that could help focus their energies towards a prosecution of an individual, or group, responsible for all the wanton destruction and human misery left behind in Starling City after the terror attack. To date,Rivers was the most senior, and only, operative involved in the attacks that the SCPD had been able to capture, with the Arrow's help, and nothing had been gleaned from him about his paymasters or their intentions in launching their assault on Starling City.

The Mayor's campaign hoped to alleviate the suffering endured by Starling residents with short term immediate financial assistance, to run alongside a long-term regeneration and rebuilding programme looking towards the future. To that end he had canvassed and sought out all the major businessmen and women in Starling to assist. A few business leaders, like Ray Palmer the billionaire owner of Palmer Technologies, and Felicity's current boss, eagerly stepped forward to offer their help. But such offers were the exception as there were many businessmen and women who were cautious, and some fearful, of the possibility of Starling facing another terror attack in the future, and thus seeing their investment come to nothing. After all, the city had faced at least three such devastating attacks in as many years, and was starting to gain a reputation across the country as a dangerous place to live.

Back at the Arrow cave, the end of shift team huddle consisted of their normal debrief of the mission, John's regular assessment of their weapons and equipment, and Felicity helping to patch up their injuries whilst keeping one eye on her monitors for post-mission alerts.

In hacking SCPD transmissions, Felicity had discovered that the man freed by Oliver in the warehouse was Michael Rosen, which she relayed to her team Arrow colleagues. It was something of a coup to finally have Rosen in police custody, but also a surprise as his allegiances had for several years been firmly rooted with the crime organisation that had been operating out of the warehouse that Team Arrow had attacked an hour earlier. His efforts in keeping their operatives out of jail and in creating a series of very lucrative financial shell corporations had garnered Rosen a special place in their organisation for over a decade. Why had they suddenly taken against their former protector?

Captain Lance had called Felicity Smoak to apprise her of the discovery of Michael Rosen at the warehouse, re-confirming Felicity's hacked information, and that he was currently talking the ears off his Sergeant in trying to get a deal cut with immunity. For Team Arrow it was the end of a good mission, with a criminal gang locked up in SCPD jail cells, and the guns they had hoped to ship out across the city on their way to an SCPD compound for cataloguing and eventual destruction. Roy, John, and Felicity were feeling the success of their recent mission and the capture of Rosen, but it was obvious that Oliver, by his expression, was not.

"I can't help feeling there's more to this story than just a working relationship gone wrong," said Oliver, his brows knitting in concern as he looked at one of the monitors on Felicity's workstation, at a picture of Rosen.

"Well the silver lining is he'll hopefully provide a lot of very useful information to the SCPD about his former employers if he wants to prevent a trip to Iron Heights to join most of them," said Felicity.

Felicity, having already checked on Roy and Diggle, who had bruises forming but nothing more serious, now walked over to the metal and glass cabinet containing the first aid kit. Roy walked back into the main area in his normal street clothes, and Diggle finished checking the last of the handguns, placing it back in the metal tray by the glass case that housed Oliver's Arrow suit. Oliver told both men to head home and get some rest and then walked over to Felicity and perched on the end of the steel workbench nearest her as she opened the first aid kit.

Felicity broke off some cotton wool, rinsed it in antiseptic fluid, and positioned herself between Oliver's legs as she dabbed at the blood caking his lips from the punch he'd taken earlier on that evening. With the team having been constantly busy since the attack on Starling City several weeks ago, this was the first time the two of them had been this close since the fateful meal they had had in Felicity's apartment several weeks ago.

That night they had declared their feelings for each other and had intended to take their relationship to a more intimate level; but that was also the night they had been attacked and Oliver had been kidnapped, ruining their romantic interlude, which they had not been able to return to. It was obvious from their quiet looks towards each other as Felicity attended to Oliver's cut lip that there were deep feelings still in evident between them.

"There, all better," said Felicity as she finished dabbing at Oliver's lip and leant forward to place a gentle kiss on him. Oliver reached a hand up behind Felicity and pulled her into his chest, her arms slipping over his shoulders, her hand caressing the back of his head. Oliver moved in for another kiss, deeper this time, but ended up wincing as the cut in his lip stretched and the bruise in his ribs alerted itself. Felicity pulled back an inch or two.

"OK, well that's as far as that is going for now," said Felicity.

"I'm sorry," whispered Oliver.

"It's OK," whispered Felicity in return, leaning in gently and placing an angel light kiss on the side Oliver's lip furthest away from the cut. She then drew back and gave him one of her over the top of her glasses looks. "But if your night time activities are going to keep getting in the way of our night time activities, I may need to lay down the law."

"Message received," said Oliver, allowing a short smile to curl up the side of his face, which finished in a mild wince due to the cut in his lip.

Felicity tidied up the used medical items, secured the first aid kit back in its case, and picked up her coat and handbag. She graced Oliver with a warm smile and headed out of the rear entrance to the Arrow cave, heading back to her apartment and few hours' sleep before she would have to be up for work at her "normal" job as Vice President of Palmer Technologies. Oliver watched her walk away, feeling a mixture of emotions, and tried not to smile again.

In a small dimly lit back office behind a bar in the Glades, a man dressed head to toe in black military utility clothing sat nursing a cut on his cheek whilst sipping at a bottled beer. The door to the room opened and a man in a dark, plain, but well-tailored suit stepped inside and closed the door behind him. The new arrival was well-built and had a clear plastic wire hooked behind his right ear and a Bluetooth device positioned in his left ear. The man walked over to the seated individual slipped a hand into his pocket and held out a mobile phone to the man with the cut cheek.

"He'd like a report," said the suited man. The mobile phone started ringing.

The injured man looked at the man standing over him, and then sighed, connecting the call with his thumb; he held the phone to his ear. A man's voice emanated from the other end of the line, but the voice was modulated so that the identity of the caller was disguised.

"What happened?" said the voice, in a deep metallic tone.

"The Arrow," said the man, "the SCPD took everyone into custody, including Rosen. They were all over us so fast. I'm the only one that managed to get away,"

"Not exactly," said the voice at the other end of the phone.

The man in the suit, stepped back a pace, reached into his inside jacket pocket, pulled out a gun fitted with a silencer, aimed the gun at the injured man and fired one bullet into his chest and one into his head; both dead centre. The gunman then bent down to retrieve the mobile phone, pocketed both it and his handgun, and walked out of the room.

John Diggle got back to his apartment in time to receive an update on his daughter Sara's adventures that day from the ARGUS approved nanny. Sara's mother, and John's partner, Lyla Michaels was not at home yet, and the nanny was eager to join her friends at a local bar. Lyla's boss at ARGUS, Amanda Waller, had sanctioned and vetted their nanny, and John often wondered if the bookish young woman that looked after his daughter all day was heading for a career with the secret government military organisation that Sara's mother worked for.

John was a little concerned that Lyla wasn't home yet as he'd received a text from her a couple of hours ago alerting him to the fact that she was Stateside again after completing a mission abroad. John was relieved to hear from the nanny that she'd received a message from Lyla to apologise for being delayed at work and could she stay with Sara until John got home. John sighed. Waller was as always at the base of most of his problems.

Less than twenty minutes later, John heard Lyla's key in the front door, as he lay on their bed, with Sara resting on his chest; his daughter quietly dozing. Lyla appeared in the doorway of the bedroom, dropped her sports holdall, and rushed over to sit by John to place a kiss on his lips. The look of relief and warmth on Lyla's face as she looked at her daughter said it all; the questioning look on Diggle's face spoke volumes too.

"What can I say, when Waller has a head of steam on, you can't say you need to leave to go and play Mommy," whispered Lyla as she bent to kiss John again.

"She tried to say something today apparently," whispered John.

"She said something?" There was a sad resignation in Lyla's voice.

"Don't beat yourself up, I missed it too," said Diggle.

"Are we bad parents?" said Lyla, rubbing her fingers down the side of her daughter's cheek.

"No," said Diggle, "we're just not the traditional kind I guess."

Lyla issued a small sigh, which Sara seemed to copy as she slept.

Roy Harper, as was his regular course of action on most evenings after he headed home after a mission, didn't head directly to his apartment, but started his own "plain clothes" patrol of his neighbourhood in the Glades. During his walk round of the streets near his apartment he would check out shops, restaurants and bars in the area, looking for signs of trouble, trying to diffuse heated situations where he found them, but squaring up to criminals where necessary.

It was on one of these night time neighbourhood patrols that Roy had encountered Peter Corvelli, the teenager that had tried to avenge his mother's mugging by taking on the three men he'd identified as her attackers with a crowbar. Roy had stopped Peter making a huge mistake, and from getting a huge beating, that night, and since then the two had become friends.

Peter was talking to a group of teenagers outside a community centre in the Glades that had sprung up in the wake of the mayor's campaign to try and help the people of that area rebuild their lives. Peter had started volunteering at the community centre and had become something of a mentor for the younger kids in the area; something that Roy had been proud to hear. Peter saw Roy approaching and excused himself from the small group of teenagers he had been talking with.

"Hey, how are things?" said Roy as Peter walked over to him.

"Good," said Peter smiling, "Thanks for getting Sergeant Burrows to come and talk to the local community group, I think it went well."

"She didn't put you off a career in the SCPD then?" said Roy, teasing Peter over his previously stated ambitions to join the police force.

"No, I'm signing up in two months as soon as I hit eighteen," said Peter.

"It's late shouldn't you be heading home?" said Roy, ever the caring guardian, which in effect he had become towards Peter.

"I am, I'm going to walk part way with some of the younger ones, make sure they get home safe," replied Peter.

"Acting like a police officer already," said Roy, who gave him a tight smile as the younger man walked away towards his waiting group.

Roy watched the group of youngsters walk away towards the end of the street and then did one more patrol around the block before heading to his apartment, and some sleep.

Just after 3.30am Sergeant Burrows walked into Captain Quentin Lance's office with two things on her mind. Lance was sipping coffee from a large SCPD mug and looking through a thick file of paper, but looked up as Burrows tapped on his open office door.

"How's it going with Mr Rosen?" said Lance, putting down his mug of coffee on his desk.

"Basically I can't get him to shut up. He's given us some good information, but he's holding back with the gold until he gets an immunity deal and a ticket out of Starling. The guy's definitely scared for his own skin," said Burrows, handing over a brief paper summary of her conversation with Michael Rosen to Lance who started to skim read.

"OK, speak to the DA and see what they can offer," said Lance who handed the paper back to Burrows. The Sergeant seemed to hover expectantly in front of Lance's desk, "something else on your mind Sergeant?"

"If I'm calling the DAs office there's a good chance I'll be speaking to your daughter," said Burrows.

"I guess. So?" said Lance quizzically.

"It might be best if you're not in the building so I don't have to lie that you were here hours after you should have gone home," said Burrows, "you know what she thinks about you working overtime."

"I certainly do," said Lance raising his eyebrows, "I'll call it a night then. But the moment you hear about a deal with the DA you call me OK?"

"Will do sir," said Burrows who left the office as Lance slipped into his three quarter length overcoat.

"Night Burrows," said Lance as he passed her desk.

"Night sir," said Burrows who looked at her boss walking away towards the exit perhaps a second or two longer than was expected.

The woman steered the van through the dark streets of downtown Starling City. Phosphorescent orange light from the street lamps she drove by regularly strobed across the windscreen and the shining black bodywork of the van. The woman obeyed the speed limit, signalled appropriately, and drew no attention to the vehicle by driving erratically; but as she drove she constantly looked out of her driver's side window, as if searching for an exit to her left.

Hidden in the shadows in the back of the van, the woman's accomplice stretched his arms and arched his back.

"I'm going to need sports therapy if we don't ditch this ride soon," he moaned.

The woman smirked but did not reply. She signalled left and turned down a side street which led on to another smaller uneven roadway, barely larger than the width of the van. The woman cruised slowly down this narrow road, slowing down further as she passed the rear of a faceless grey concrete tenement building. Its windows were all smashed and the door at ground level was taped up with a warning notice about structural damage inside.

The woman steered the van onwards for several more yards, where the alley opened up on the left into a larger roadway full of garages, the metal corrugated shutters on all the entranceways either covered in graffiti or warped and buckled by attempts to break inside.

"Where are we?" said the accomplice, edging up to the back of the driver's seat, peering out through the windscreen.

"Home," said the woman.

 **Chapter Two**

The man that staggered out of the warehouse and in to the waiting arms of the SCPD, with all their guns trained on him was the mob's favourite accountant and all round Mr Fix It, Michael Rosen. Imprisoned in Iron Heights four years ago after a long running operation mounted by the SCPD and local FBI officers, the Accountant went down for twenty years for his part in concealing the ill-gotten gains of Starling City's mob bosses. Known as The Escape Artist, due to his ability in keeping criminals out of jail,he had previously never revealed anything about his employers even though he had been offered an immunity deal by the FBI that many in the SCPD baulked at in light of his crimes.

The man-made earthquake triggered by Malcom Merlyn two years ago, which damaged part of Iron Heights and which unfortunately set free some of Team Arrow's worst adversaries over the past eighteen months, also set free one Michael Rosen. Not a big name inside or out, in fact a model prisoner whilst incarcerated, his name went unmentioned in the list of escaped inmates curiously concealed by the prison authorities. Local law enforcement had more pressing concerns in light of the absconding of several of Starling City's most dangerous prisoners to worry about a thinly built bearded boffin with a penchant for Savile Row suits and fine wine. Other more violent inmates had to be recaptured as quickly as possible, so there was no pressing need to go chasing after a pencil pusher.

Rosen seemingly vanished from the world for a few weeks, and then quietly re-surfaced back into his old life, protected by his old employers, for whom he had made a lot of money, and for whom he began to work for again, to make them even more money. A Federal warrant was issued for his arrest months after it was revealed that he had got out of Iron Heights during the night of the Undertaking; but there were no leads to follow, and no-one came forward to offer any.

After he had been found by the SCPD six hours ago, stumbling out of a dilapidated warehouse in the Glades, Rosen had been transferred to SCPD headquarters in Starling and questioned by Sergeant Burrows. The Sergeant, desperately in need of a hot shower and a few hours' sleep, stood in front of her boss's desk as he flicked through the report she had delivered five minutes ago.

"He told you all this? Of his own free will?" said Lance, astounded by the sudden change in the man that had gone to prison rather than cough up any secrets about his former mob associates. Now apparently, he was not only able to talk about his connection to organised crime, but completely willing to let every single secret come tumbling out.

"I couldn't stop him talking; the stenographer couldn't keep up with him."

"Four years ago he never talked, not one word for months no matter how many times I questioned him. He wouldn't give up any of his mob buddies," said Lance staring at the paper in his hand, "and now he wants to sing like a…."

Lance stopped and swallowed hard. He couldn't say the word out loud; canary. Sara's chosen name in the League of Assassins. Lance sat back and sighed. His thoughts suddenly turned to his youngest daughter. It had been an age since they last spoke. Lance chewed his lip a little and then handed the report back to Burrows.

"Any news from the DA?" said Lance.

"Still in with him and his lawyer, it's been an hour now," sighed Burrows.

"Go home Burrows, you're dead on your feet," said Lance standing up and walking around the outside of his desk to stand in front of his Sergeant.

"No, sir, I need to finish this," said Burrows looking up into Lance's eyes, her determination obvious to him.

"I appreciate that, but the wrangling with the DA could go on for hours yet. Go home, get some rest. If anything major happens I'll call you," said Lance, who placed a hand on his Sergeant's upper arm and started to steer her out of his office. Burrows felt her exhaustion start to overwhelm her and nodded her head in assent.

"What about Morgan?" said Burrows as she turned at the open doorway of Lance's office, "I haven't had a chance to update her yet. She doesn't like being the last to know."

"Yeah I got that impression too," said Lance sitting down heavily in his office chair and reaching for his heart medication, "don't worry, I'll call her. Now get going."

In the condemned tenement building in the Glades that the woman and her accomplice are now using as their bolthole, a mobile phone was ringing. Though it is morning outside and the pale blue sky is bright with weak spring sunshine, inside the tenement building the light is dim as the windows have been boarded up and there is no electricity to power the remaining light fixtures in the dilapidated structure. Two battery powered standing arc lamps have been positioned at each end of the small room to provide the woman and her accomplice with the light they need to complete their tasks, which at this present moment appear to be assembling weapons and bomb making equipment on two small camping tables set up in the centre of the damp-smelling concrete room.

The woman had previously ignored the ringing mobile over the last hour as it trilled away, but this time when it started to ring she got up from her metal chair. The woman walked over to a long wooden trestle table in one corner of the room they have commandeered on the ground floor, which housed a display of a variety of military grade equipment and bent to look at the flashing phone resting on the table. She sighed audibly before she pressed to connect the call via speakerphone, turning to place her finger vertically against her lips to signal silence from her accomplice, busy with some wiring.

"At last," says an exasperated voice at the other end of the line. The man's voice coming through the speaker was heavily disguised in a deep bass tone. Both the woman and her accomplice recognised the voice of their former paymaster, who had been behind the assault on Starling several weeks ago.

"I've been calling for over an hour. I don't like being kept waiting," said the voice, sternly.

"I had my hands full," said the woman, making no effort to be conciliatory.

"Nothing too taxing I hope," said the man, his voice softening.

"What can I do for you?" said the woman, changing the subject swiftly.

"Straight to business, a woman after my own heart," said the man. The woman rolled her eyes in annoyance and her accomplice clamped his hand over his mouth to stop the sound of his laughter from alerting the caller to another person listening in to their conversation.

"I have a friend who needs a favour. My plans depend on being able to call this favour in from this friend," said the mystery man.

"And the favour the friend needs is what?"

"A man is going to be transported from SCPD headquarters in Starling to an undisclosed location in the next 12 hours. Once he reaches his destination he will disappear into witness protection and into a new life. My friend doesn't want this man to have that new life. In fact he'd rather this man had no life at all."

"I have a feeling your friend may be connected to a highly publicised event that occurred last night in a warehouse in the Glades. If that is so you need to know that my usual fee has just doubled," said the woman coolly.

"Money is not an option," boasted the man, his booming bass tone echoing around the small windowless room.

"In that case my fee just tripled. I will text you an account number; you will transfer the funds in the next sixty minutes. When this is done, call me with the details I'll need."

"Agreed," said the man, "it's good to work with you again Mrs Jones."

"My name is never to be mentioned out loud again, is that clear?!" the woman's eyes blazed as she gripped the mobile handset. She stabbed her thumb down on the phone's screen terminating the call, and slammed the mobile down on to the trestle table. The woman leaned both hands against the flat of the table and breathed a slow breath out. When she turned to face her accomplice again her expression was back in the cool, detached mask that was her default setting for life.

"Who's the friend do you think?" said her accomplice, pulling at some wiring.

"He hasn't got any friends," said the woman, "he's got someone in play and needs them protected for some reason."

"It's an easy job…" the man started.

"It's a distraction," snapped the woman.

"A distraction that pays very well," said the accomplice.

The woman looked over at her colleague, held his gaze for a few seconds, and then gave him a brief nod.

"I'll handle it, you have other distractions to take care of," said the woman, picking up her rifle and checking the gun sight.

In the headquarters building of Palmer Technology, Felicity strode into her office on the thirty-ninth floor, saying hello to her assistant Jerry as she passed his desk in the atrium outside, and went to hang up her overcoat on the coat stand in the far corner of the room. Then stepping over to her desk she dropped her handbag on to the polished surface of her glass topped desk, and sat in her chair, tapping her fingers across her ergonomic keyboard to unlock her computer.

Felicity sighed. There were already a string of emails bearing the same title in the subject line from her boss Ray Palmer, CEO of Palmer Technologies. The subject line title was "A few thoughts I had overnight". If the amount of emails in her inbox were anything to go on, and their recorded date and time certainly bore out this assumption, it looked like Ray didn't get much sleep last night.

Felicity loved her new job as Vice President of Palmer Technologies, she loved the large salary, the fact she had her own Executive Assistant, and loved the level of responsibility that came with the position. She even loved working with the CEO, Ray Palmer, his energy and commitment was infectious, and he had won over the majority of the staff in the building with his boyish charm and can do attitude. But sometimes, just sometimes, she wished he would just take a day off.

As if the man himself had read her mind, Palmer came bounding in to Felicity's office, carrying a small espresso cup. From the slightly wild look in his eyes, Felicity guessed he'd probably had one too many of these already this morning.

"Hey, what did you think" said Palmer, tipping back the last of his espresso.

"About what?" said Felicity, her eyes quickly scanning her electronic calendar for the schedule for that day.

"About the ideas I had overnight for the city regeneration project meeting. You know with the mayor. I emailed you like five times," said Ray.

"I've literally just walked in the office, I haven't had a chance to check my schedule today let alone read the twelve emails you sent. Not five," said Felicity archly.

"Oh. Twelve, really?" said Ray, his eyes wide and his eyebrows shooting upwards, "Hmm, I was busy last night. Anyway, I'll leave you to read them all. We can talk about your thoughts on the way over there at 10.30."

"Over where at 10.30?" said Felicity, her brows knitting in confusion as she checked her diary, where there was "Project Time" blocking out her whole morning, but no appointment recorded, "there's no appointment in my diary."

"Oh well there wouldn't be. I only decided ten minutes ago that you need to accompany me to the Mayor's office for my 10.30am meeting, with him, about the city regeneration plans that I emailed you about overnight. All twelve of them apparently. So, I'll see you in about an hour, downstairs, in the car, heading off to the Mayor's office," said Ray as he smiled at Felicity, and then turned to walk out of her office.

Definitely too many espressos thought Felicity, as she manually adjusted her diary and pushed her Project Time back twenty-four hours, before turning to the first of the twelve emails Ray had sent overnight to her account. Before she started reading them however, she needed to get herself a coffee.

Just as Felicity was taking her first sip of her latte, the male portion of Team Arrow was beginning their regular morning training regime. After brief warming exercises, for which each man had his own preferred technique, Oliver would take both Roy and John through their paces with bow and arrow, short and long fighting sticks, before they ended in a free for all with two on one, and one on one, hand to hand combat practice.

The mood was light this morning, with plenty of banter flowing between the three men, especially from Roy, but Oliver always pulled them back from too much enjoyment as they trained. They were after all learning to protect themselves and the man standing next to them. The skills they practiced could save lives, including their own, and they were all in effect lethal weapons and should be cognisant of that.

John was very much on Oliver's wavelength in this regard, the tough trained soldier always evident in everything that John Diggle ever did or said, so he also did his best to leaven out Roy's comedic excesses; but in a way John knew Roy better than Oliver and knew that allowing him his moments of levity were a surer way to improve his understanding of what he was doing than by purely beating the message into him. The men continued to train with brief pauses for caught breath and hydration through to nearly lunchtime. John and Roy showered and changed clothes and then headed out of the rear exit of the Arrow cave to go and buy lunch.

On their way back to the Arrow cave with Korean take-out for three, John and Roy heard a commotion outside a store on the opposite side of the street. As they stopped amongst other bystanders and looked, a small kid, no more than fifteen, was being pushed to the ground by two men who were old enough to know better. People nearby looked on in disgust, but no-one made a move to intercede on the teenager's behalf, until that was Peter Corvelli came racing out of the store in front of where the incident was taking place, and starting remonstrating with the two large thugs as he tried to help the boy to his feet.

"He literally can't stop himself," muttered Roy, with a sigh.

"You know that kid?" said Diggle.

"Yeah, I met him a few weeks back and stopped him from doing something stupid," said Roy, his eyes fixed on the scene on the other side of the road. To his dismay, one of the thugs shoved Peter, who immediately shoved back.

"Looks like he needs a reminder," said John, who double guessing what was about to take place, checked both ways as he stepped across the street, Roy at his heels.

Just as the second thug was about to lay hands on Peter, the man mountain that was John Diggle appeared by the young man's side. Roy then appeared and bent to help the teenager up off of the floor. John stayed silent and stared at the thug nearest him, his face impassive, his fist balled tightly around the handle of the bag containing the lunch he and Roy had just bought.

The first thug, who had pushed the kid to the floor and kick-started the incident, grabbed hold of his friends arm and pulled him back.

"C'mon man," he muttered.

The second thug stepped forward one step and glared at Diggle, who did not move or change his steely expression. The thug then spat out a laugh and turned and walked away, his friend at his heels.

"What did I tell you about walking into situations you can't get out of?" said Roy addressing Peter Corvelli.

"What was I supposed to do, they were picking on him," said Peter plaintively.

The kid who had been the victim of the thug's aggression looked from Peter, to John, to Roy, and back at Peter, his expression a mixture of surprise and relief, and mumbled his thanks, which Peter dismissed and told the boy to run along.

"You know you're not a cop yet," said Roy, more warmth in his tone. Peter half grinned and held up a hand to Roy, and nodded at Diggle as he went back into the store that he had charged out of moments earlier.

Back at the Arrow cave, and with their post work-out meal consumed, Roy took a call on his mobile from Thea who needed his help with an event being put on in Verdant, the night club she owned; thirty feet above their heads in the Arrow cave. Roy left to walk around the block and make it appear that he was arriving at the front door of Verdant from another part of town, and not from the secret lair below the Verdant night club floor; a lair that Thea knew nothing of.

Oliver, as always trained at least an hour or two longer than Roy and Diggle, so he continued to pound on the padded dummy at the opposite end of the room to Felicity's workstation whilst John busied himself checking Team Arrow's weapons and equipment cache.

John caught Oliver glance over at the fern that Felicity had bought him a few months ago when he had moved into the Arrow cave after losing his mansion, his company, and pretty much all his savings due to the machinations of Slade Wilson. A strange wistful expression momentarily passed over Oliver's face before his look hardened and he reverted back to the focussed glare he assumed for training.

After showering, and finally eating, Oliver walked back into the central hub of the Arrow cave, having changed into a light grey t-shirt and tan combats, and walked over to Felicity's workstation, checking the monitors for any alerts. Before Felicity had joined Oliver's crusade he had been adept at fending for himself when it came to IT, but his skills were basic and fuelled by necessity. Felicity had transformed the success of his and John's, and then Roy's, missions after dark by her amazing technical abilities; she had quickly, and so easily, become indispensable to Team Arrow. The fear was apparent to all of them, if Felicity wasn't here, could we still cope?

The guys knew not to touch Felicity's IT equipment unless they knew what they were doing, and in Roy and John's case they were happy not to go anywhere near her cobalt encrypted workstation. Oliver gently moved Felicity's chair on its coasters a little to the right, and leaned in to look at the central monitor, clicking on a link that appeared on the screen, which brought up a report from an online newspaper about the Mayor's forthcoming campaign gala. Oliver briefly scanned some of the names the report mentioned as part of the guest list, pulled his lips taut, and clasped his hands behind his back.

John walked over to join Oliver at the workstation, and glanced at the report that was on the central monitor. One of the photos featured in the report, alongside a picture of the Mayor, was Ray Palmer. It was a photo taken at the launch of the new Palmer Technologies logo on the former Queen Consolidated building, and in the corner of the photo one very talented blonde IT girl could be seen standing and applauding her new boss. John glanced to his right and saw the muscle in Oliver's right cheek tighten.

"We've been so busy these past few weeks, I haven't had a chance to ask," said Diggle softly, not looking at Oliver, "You and Felicity..?"

Oliver turned away from the workstation and walked towards the centre of the operational hub area, the question left hanging in the air. John turned to face Oliver, whose expression seemed to highlight his desire to want to say something, which was hindered by his general inability to openly discuss his feelings.

"And please don't let's go down the whole the last date was a disaster route again," said Diggle, raising an eyebrow.

Oliver stopped pacing around and stood still, his feet slightly apart. He hung his head briefly, breathed out slowly, and then raised his head, looking at Diggle.

"It's like we're standing on the verge of something that both of us want, but there's always something in the way," said Oliver gently, "a new lead to track down, a new mission, always keeping our focus out on the streets, giving us no time to talk."

John was momentarily taken aback by the openness of Oliver's words. Not being a man that easily confessed his feelings himself, he had nothing but sympathy and respect for his friend for revealing this much.

"Then find the time," said Diggle

"Another night off? The last one didn't end up going so well," said Oliver raising his eyebrows at the memory of how he and Felicity's romantic interlude was cut short by tranquiliser darts and his own kidnapping. "With the way things are at the moment we don't have the luxury of taking our foot off the pedal right now."

"Then just take a couple of hours. Roy and I can handle things," said Diggle stepping forward towards Oliver, "I mean it man, go have dinner, the city won't fall apart if you clock on a bit late for a shift."

Oliver looked at Diggle, ready to dismiss the suggestion, because he felt so responsible for the team, and for saving Starling City, that he wouldn't ever tolerate a lack of focus in any of his Team Arrow partners, let alone himself. But as Oliver looked at Diggle's face, and saw nothing but determination and care in it, his thoughts instantly turned to Felicity, and his eyes glanced over at her empty chair by her workstation.

"A couple of hours," said Oliver in agreement, nodding his head briefly and once at Diggle.

In SCPD headquarters on the edge of the Glades, the Starling City District Attorney, Special Agent Kate Morgan, and Michael Rosen's lawyer were still hammering through the deal that would place the mob's favourite financial Mr Fix it under extended protective custody until his admission to the witness protection programme could be finalised. Captain Lance was glad that the negotiations were taking so long as it meant that Sergeant Kate Burrows, who had been dead on her feet at 03.30am this morning, was getting an extended and well-earned rest.

Everyone in Lance's immediate team had been working flat out over the last few weeks in the aftermath of the attack on Starling City by the unknown terror organisation, but he had noticed that Burrows had been working above and beyond what was expected of any of his other officers. Lance had hand-picked Burrows to be the liaison between the SCPD and Morgan's national taskforce on organised crime, and Morgan had been working his Sergeant pretty hard over the past few weeks. Burrows however, who had relished the opportunity to be of use to Lance and the taskforce had insisted that the new role would not get in the way of her regular community activity with youth workers in the Glades, or stop her from being an active member of the detective team. As such, she had been burning the candle at both ends and on the odd occasion in the middle, in order to facilitate all her obligations to her colleagues.

Lance had respect for that kind of attitude, and he knew that as the most recent addition to the SCPD force, after her transfer from Central City several months ago, Burrows felt she had a lot to prove to the other officers in her team. Lance also knew that if Burrows continued the way she currently was then something was going to give; he knew intimately that committing everything to "the job" was a sure way to end up in the hospital.

Burrows had already had a spell in Starling General after she ended up on the wrong end of a botched robbery and a slug from a .38 during the terror assault on the city several weeks ago. His Sergeant had been lucky and her recovery rapid, but Lance was wondering if she had returned to full-time active duty a little too soon. Lance had absolutely no desire to visit her in hospital again. He made a firm note to talk to Burrows as soon as the situation with Michael Rosen was safely settled.

"It's settled," said Special Agent Morgan as she strode into Captain Lance's office, jogging him out of his reverie about Burrows, and slightly unnerving him by her choice of words; as if she had been listening to his thoughts.

"I'm guessing he asked for the freedom of Las Vegas," said Lance, sitting upright in his chair, "what did we barter him down to?"

"We didn't," said Morgan, who ignored the thunderous expression that appeared on Lance's face and ploughed on, "He gave us enough to indicate that he has gold. But he won't give us anymore until he's away from this city and has a new life. So he gets the freedom of Las Vegas. My team are preparing the logistics to transport him out of Starling. We'll be leaving in a couple of hours."

"Wait, wait, a second," said Lance rising to his feet and holding out a hand palm towards Morgan, "this is our collar. You can't take him!"

"I can do anything I want to Captain if it meets the need of the national directive that sent me here, and that the Starling City DA's and Mayor's offices have agreed to support," said Morgan coolly, turning on her heel and walking towards the open doorway of Lance's office where she spun around and faced Lance.

"I'm taking Rosen, get your paperwork sorted, you have two hours," said Morgan, "where's Burrows? She's earned her ride with us. That's one hell of an officer you've got there Captain. My guess is you won't be able to hold on to that shooting star much longer."

Morgan allowed the briefest of tight smiles to curl up the side of her mouth, before she disappeared across the open plan office full of uniformed officers and their plan clothes detective colleagues, all busy with their various tasks, and slipped through the connecting doorway towards the interview room where Rosen had been questioned for the past few hours.

Lance wasn't sure what was making him angrier, Morgan's supercilious attitude, or her last comment about him losing Burrows.

Sergeant Burrows missed her ride with Special Agent Morgan by twenty minutes. Lance, though in no way happy about the arrangements, was never one to drag his heels when he knew he couldn't win and got the paperwork processed for Rosen's release into Federal custody well within the two hour deadline. With no reason for her to stay any longer than she needed to, Morgan decided to bring forward Rosen's transport. The unmarked sedan car containing herself and one of her team driving, and Rosen and another Federal officer in the rear left SCPD headquarters a little after 4.00pm.

Lance updated Burrows with the deal that Rosen had been able to cut with the DA and Federal authorities and was gratified to see that Burrows was as frustrated as he had been when he had discovered what Morgan had agreed to. Lance watched as Burrows paced up and down slowly in front of his desk, a confused look on her face.

"You know if I had carpet in here, I'd have a rut in it right now. What is it?" said Lance, leaning back in his chair.

Burrows stopped pacing and rubbed the side of her neck. She breathed out a slow sigh and then took a seat in the chair opposite Lance.

"I dunno, sir. It's probably nothing," said Burrows, leaning forward and clasping her hands together, her forearms leaning on her thighs.

"Spit it out Burrows," said Lance, leaning forward and resting his forearms on his desk, knitting his fingers together.

"Why make the deal so quickly? I don't know her well, but Morgan's not the trusting type, yet she speaks to this guy and within a few hours she's agreeing to a deal that redefines the word generous," Burrows straightened up, looking directly into Lance's eyes, "Then she's pulling out all the stops to get him transported out of Starling before the ink's dry on the paperwork. The guy was scared, he could have been rattling off any lie he could think of just to stay safe. Something doesn't feel right."

"You're the kind of cop that trusts your gut," said Lance, "so am I. You're also the kind of cop that doesn't make false accusations against a senior Federal officer unless there is proof to back it up."

"Yes sir, sorry, I…..," said Burrows, standing up, thinking she was being reprimanded.

"So, keep your eyes peeled for that proof," said Lance, "and keep trusting your gut."

A look passed between Captain and Sergeant, an unspoken agreement that both understood without a word having to be passed between them. Both their guts were telling them not to trust Special Agent Morgan, but they didn't know why. All they knew for certain was that they could trust each other.

An hour later, Roy harper stepped into the SCPD Headquarters on the edge of the Glades, and headed for the second floor offices where the detective team were based, looking for Sergeant Burrows. Roy was no stranger to the precinct having been a frequent visitor during his juvenile delinquent phase; he was happy to be able to walk in unaided and unshackled these days.

Harper caught sight of Burrows immediately, talking with a uniformed officer by the water cooler, as she looked over some papers in a brown foolscap folder. Harper raised his eyebrows in greeting and held up a hand, signalling he wanted to talk to her as he stood by her desk. Burrows handed the folder back to the uniformed officer and walked over to Harper.

"To what do I owe the pleasure Mr Harper?" said Burrows.

"I just came by to say thanks, for helping Peter Corvelli with his group. It's making a difference he says."

"He's a good kid," said Burrows, slipping off her suit jacket and sliding it around the back of the chair by her desk, "I wish there were more like him, more projects like that. It would make my job a hell of a lot easier."

"I don't know if he's mentioned it but he wants to join the police force when he hits eighteen. I was wondering if you'd talk to him about it; maybe let him shadow you for a few hours," said Roy.

"My schedule is pretty tight, but I'd be glad to help if I can," said Burrows.

"Mr Harper are you distracting my Sergeant in the course of her duties?" said Captain Lance, his voice dripping with sarcasm as he approached Burrows desk. "I hope not, because from what I hear from certain community and civic leaders in this city, she's the only positive news story the SCPD has at the moment. And I wouldn't want you stopping her good work from continuing."

"Then how come it's always you I see on the news and not Sergeant Burrows here?" said Roy with mock seriousness.

"Because my rank has added bonuses, like locking up smart mouthed former juvies just on a whim for instance," said Lance staring at Harper.

Burrows smiled a rueful grin at Lance, who returned her smile and held her gaze for a moment; a moment that Roy Harper noticed before he held his hands in mock defence and walked away towards the exit of the open plan office.

Having done all he could at the Arrow cave, and with a few hours to kill before he would have to "clock" on with Team Arrow, John Diggle headed back to his apartment to spend some time with his daughter Sara. When Diggle arrived home, he was surprised and delighted to see his partner Lyla Michaels playing with Sara on the living room carpet, a jumble of soft toys scattered around the pair of them.

In between receiving kisses from John, and continuing to play with Sara, Lyla told Diggle that she had been assigned a hometown mission for the next few days, shadowing an international businessman whose safety was of concern her boss, the head of ARGUS, Amanda Waller.

"Since when did Waller worry herself about the state of the Fortune 500 list?" said John as he held up a small stuffed lion and wiggled it in front of Sara, raising a small toothless smile from her.

"Since we received intel from a reliable source that an act of international terrorism was going to be committed on home soil; the target is a foreign national, but that's all we have," said Lyla in a soothing voice, smiling at her daughter. "Waller has several of her agents covering high profile international visitors currently Stateside. I get the Head of the Asian Pacific Banking Group, currently in Starling on a fact finding mission as part of the Mayor's campaign for regeneration of the city."

"Great, does that mean you'll be home for dinner every evening?" said John, warmly looking at his partner, as she rose to her feet.

"I work for ARGUS John, not Toys R Us," said Lyla coolly as she sauntered past him and headed into the kitchen.

Felicity was trying to put her arm into the sleeve of her coat, hold on to her handbag and make a call on her mobile at the same time as she emerged through the large glass rotating doors at the front of the Palmer Technology building in downtown Starling.

"Hey," said Oliver suddenly appearing from her left.

"Oh! Hey, what are you doing here? Is everything OK, is it John or Roy?" said Felicity staring at Oliver and dropping her arm, her coat pooling around the back of her legs. Oliver stepped around the back of Felicity and gallantly scooped up her coat, assisting her to put it on. Felicity spun on her heel to face Oliver, the expression on her face one of surprise at Oliver's appearance at her place of work and fear that he was going to tell her something awful.

"Everything's fine, I just thought I'd surprise you," soothed Oliver with his gentle burr, "I'm sort of regretting not phoning you first."

"It's OK, sorry, it's a nice surprise. It's just been a busy day. So, did you want to walk me to the Arrow cave or something? Sorry, I know you don't call it that. The rest of us do though, you know that right?" said Felicity, her words coming out in a babble.

Oliver smiled, his blue eyes twinkling with warmth.

"I thought we might make a detour on route," said Oliver, whose tone was warm at first and then went mock serious as he enunciated the next three words, "to the Foundry."

Dusk was settling in as Oliver and Felicity got out of the taxi a few blocks away from the Foundry. Oliver had been completely unforthcoming as to their destination, despite Felicity asking him twice outright; the only reply she got was a small tight smile and a slightly raised eyebrow. Felicity and Oliver walked to the end of the street, where the taxi had dropped them, in companionable silence. Oliver gestured with his right hand, indicating that they needed to cross to the other side of the road, and as they were doing so Felicity noticed that they seemed to be heading in the direction of one of Starling's better hotels, the Grand. As Oliver stopped outside of the hotel, she glanced up at its façade and then at Oliver, and swallowed a little intake of breath.

Oliver took hold of Felicity's hand, smiled gently, and then walked past the entrance to the hotel, and turned right down the roadway leading down the side of the building. Reaching the rear of the building, Oliver guided Felicity past the staff entrance and the loading bay to the external metal staircase that zig-zagged its way up the full height of the hotel.

"Not far now," said Oliver as he started to ascend the staircase, Felicity following, a curious look on her face. Having recovered from her immediate and initial surprise that Oliver was taking her to a hotel; she was now wondering why they appeared to be climbing up the outside of that same building. The increase in her heartbeat was matched by a surge of questions being fired across her brain.

After a couple of minutes, the two arrived on the roof of the hotel, and Oliver, surprisingly breathing normally after his exertion, helped a panting Felicity as she stepped off of the stairwell and on to the concrete roof of the building. Oliver continued to hold Felicity's hand as he looked around the roof area, seemingly searching for something.

"Are you part bat?" gasped Felicity, thinking that Oliver seemed more comfortable up on high looking down on the world.

"What?" said Oliver distractedly.

"Nothing. Are we going to get arrested for trespass?" said Felicity looking around, and keeping an ear out for possible alarms going off.

"Not unless we're really noisy," muttered Oliver, who walked across the roof towards the front of the hotel. Felicity followed, and the two of them stood by the roof ledge looking out at the skyline of Starling City that their lofty eyrie presented to them. As the last rays of the day faded across the horizon, the lights of the streets and buildings of Starling had come on, lighting up the early night sky. Oliver took in, and let out, a deep contented breath.

"This is one of my favourite views of the city," he said, before he walked behind Felicity and disappeared behind the raised roof top entranceway just off to their right. When he re-emerged he was holding a small metal folding table bearing an ice bucket containing a bottle of champagne and two fluted glasses. Felicity smiled, knowing that Oliver must have pre-planned this little diversion for the two of them. Oliver walked back over to Felicity, positioned the folding table between them, opened the champagne and poured two glasses, handing one to Felicity.

"What shall we toast," purred Felicity, holding up her glass centimetres from Oliver's.

"To seizing the moment," said Oliver tipping his glass towards Felicity's.

"To seizing the moment," echoed Felicity.

They both took a long sip of the heady fizzy wine, and smiled. Oliver stepped towards Felicity and bent his head towards hers, placing a gentle kiss on her lips. Before this seized moment even had a chance to develop Oliver's mobile phone started ringing. Oliver pulled away from Felicity, who began to think that the two of them would never find the time to be together when there was always an emergency to keep them apart. As she looked at Oliver, who stepped away to take the call she could see that he didn't seem at all concerned that their romantic moment had been interrupted.

"Great, I'll be right there," said Oliver, who then terminated the call and slipped his mobile into his jacket pocket and walked over to hand Felicity his glass, "don't go anywhere."

Oliver then disappeared over to the other side of the roof and descended down the external metal stairwell that they had used to climb to the roof less than ten minutes earlier. Felicity was bemused and confused, not knowing how long Oliver would be gone, and why he had abandoned her on the roof of the hotel.

Less than five minutes later Oliver re-emerged back on the roof, having re-ascended the metal stairwell again, except he was carrying something. As he approached Felicity across the roof she could see it was a pizza box. Felicity raised an eyebrow.

"Ahh, pizza and champagne. An underrated classic combination."

For the next twenty minutes Oliver and Felicity ate pizza, sipped champagne, stole glances at each other, and looked out over the panorama of Starling City as the night drew in.

"Why do you like it up here?" said Felicity, moving to stand by Oliver's side, taking a sip from her glass.

"It gives me perspective," said Oliver calmly, "Slade Wilson taught me that."

Felicity baulked at the mention of the man's name. Wilson was the monster that had ended Oliver's mother's life, the man that had nearly ended Felicity's life. The man that had ended a lot of other lives before Oliver had stopped him and his marauding mirakuru army over a year ago.

"How can you do that?" said Felicity turning to look at Oliver.

"Do what?"

"Mention his name without turning green or your head spinning around or something," answered Felicity.

"Felicity there are too many things I can't control and I can never change. That doesn't mean I forgive, or forget," said Oliver determinedly, "but I can't allow my feelings to control my actions."

"So you shut your feelings away?" said Felicity, searching Oliver's eyes.

"No, not all the time," breathed Oliver, moving towards Felicity. He reached out and deposited his wine glass on the folding table beside them and then wrapped his arms around Felicity's back, who reached her hands, one gripping her glass, up over Oliver's shoulders as he pulled her into him. Their kisses, at first tender, soon deepened with passion.

A few feet away from their fervent embrace a couple of pigeons had flown down on to the roof, their cooing gradually getting louder as they approached the pair. The noise of the birds suddenly cut through to the amorous couple, who briefly pulled apart.

"I think that's pigeon for get a room," said Felicity.

Several blocks away from Verdant nightclub, in a particularly depressed area of the Glades, Peter Corvelli was doing his usual "big brother" act and walking two of the boys from his mentoring project back towards the tenement block where they lived. All three were chatting animatedly, but they were all conscious not to raise their voices too loudly, as they intimately knew the kind of neighbourhood they were walking though; making yourself noticed was not a good idea in this part of the Glades.

The group stopped briefly on the corner of the street where the boys lived and said their goodbyes, then Peter watched them until they entered their apartment block, and turned back to begin retracing his route. After a few metres Peter glanced at his watch and saw that it was later than he had thought. He was scheduled to call his mother in less than twenty minutes, and he knew that if he followed his "safe" route he would miss this deadline. His mother had enough to worry about right now with all her terrible health problems, she was expecting and looking forward to his call and he didn't want to upset her by breaking his promise to speak to her every night at eight.

Peter realised that if he took a shortcut through Temple Street, he could easily shave off part of his route and would be home in time to call his mother. He sped up his pace and took a right, heading across a part of the city he normally avoided.

Five minutes later, Peter was heading down an alleyway past a condemned building, the posters across the back entrance proclaiming the dangers waiting inside for anyone trespassing on the property. There was a noise from inside the building. Peter stopped briefly, and was about to carry on walking but he heard another noise, and saw a light as if from a torch being waved come out through one of the broken windows on the ground floor. What if it was kids playing in there, or perhaps a homeless person hoping to take shelter for the night? Peter wanted to walk away, he would be late to call his Mom, but he couldn't; the core of him, deep inside, that wanted to do good and help people, wouldn't let him step away.

Peter Corvelli, unlikely hero, just shy of his eighteenth birthday, stepped over to the wooden door at the rear of the building, and reached for the handle. It was unlocked and opened easily.

"Hello, is there someone in here?" he called out as he stepped across the threshold and into the darkened building.

 **Chapter Three**

Felicity and Oliver descended from the roof of the hotel at 3rd and Franklin, and hailed a taxi to take them to within a block of Verdant nightclub; they walked the rest of the way and entered the subterranean Arrow cave via the secret rear entrance. It was dark as they entered, the light from the various workstation monitors casting a faint luminous glow across the polished surfaces.

Felicity looked around but couldn't see any sign of John or Roy, and she threw a quizzical look at Oliver as she walked over to the main power handle on the concrete pillar by the entrance stairs to the Arrow cave. Felicity's hand gripped the handle, ready to throw it upwards and turn on the main lights in the room, but she hesitated from doing so. Diggle and Roy were usually here by now; where were they?

"I told them to arrive later tonight," said Oliver gently, casting a searching glance towards Felicity.

"Oh," she said, completely understanding his look and his meaning.

"I thought….," started Oliver, before Felicity cut him off, with a simple "Yes."

For Felicity the next two or three seconds, as they stood in the quiet, dark room looking at each other, seemed to take an eternity. Then Oliver was moving towards her, and she towards him, and time suddenly had no meaning, and the world disappeared.

Across town, in the basement of the SCPD headquarters building, Michael Rosen was being brought through the fire exit stairwell by two suited federal agents and four uniformed SCPD officers, their guns drawn in case of any attack. Captain Lance and Special Agent Morgan stood by the unmarked silver grey sedan that would transport Rosen to his new life. Lance chewed on his lip and rubbed his chest, which felt tight; he couldn't tell if it was because of his cardiac condition or whether he was just peptic with anger at the deal that Rosen had managed to wangle out of Morgan.

The SCPD officers positioned themselves around the car, whilst the two Feds manoeuvred Rosen into the back seat, one of them getting in alongside him. Rosen held up his hands, cuffed at the wrists, but the Federal agent sitting by his side threw him a stern look that brooked no argument. The cuffs were obviously staying on. The other Federal agent got in the driver's seat of the car and switched on the engine. Morgan took a look around the car park, looked at her watch and then looked at Lance.

"I'll make sure your assistance with this transfer is noted," said Morgan coolly, then slipped in the passenger seat of the sedan, slammed the door, and the car pulled away from Lance and his uniformed cops and sped up the car park ramp and out on to the dark street beyond.

"I bet you will," muttered Lance sarcastically.

Several blocks away from the Foundry, Laurel Lance was coming to the end of her sparring session with her trainer Ted Grant. A sheen of sweat covered Laurel's arms and the back of her neck, her long hair pulled back into a pleated plait flicked from side to side as she ducked and weaved, fending off Ted's blows and trading punches back. Having been training with Ted for several weeks now her breathing pattern had developed to such a degree that she no longer needed to take regular time outs to catch her breath. In spending more time focussing on skill and technique, and less on throwing random and wild punches, she had developed control and stamina. Her body was changing, she felt fitter than she'd ever been, and she liked her new found strength. As a lawyer she'd had enough experience of dealing with victims of crime to know that the perpetrators always took advantage of the weak. Laurel was determined she would never be in such a position.

In the weeks after her sister Sara had been murdered, she would have given anything to have felt the control and power that she felt now; but at the time of her death she was lost, angry and had no output for that anger. Knowing that she would never turn to booze or pills again, she had found herself in Ted's Wildcat Gym in the Glades, looking at a flyer about learning to box, and before she knew it she had signed up for regular classes. Laurel considered it one of the best decisions she had ever made. Her father and Oliver disagreed. How times change thought Laurel; once upon a time those two men had never seen eye to eye.

Despite the regularity of her boxing training, Laurel was still nowhere near as experienced in fighting as Roy, and she was leagues behind that of Diggle and Oliver's level of expertise. This however didn't stop her from wanting to get out on the streets, fighting the criminals that she saw everyday passing through the courthouse and the DAs office in her day job as a lawyer.

"Laurel, you're drifting," said Ted, throwing a punch that almost connected with Laurel's cheek due to her defences being soft.

"Sorry, go again," breathed Laurel, holding up her gloved hands defensively and bouncing on the sprung mat of the boxing ring.

"I think we'll call it a night," said Ted, stepping back from Laurel and spitting his mouth guard out into his gloved hand, "you've already gone twenty minutes over your normal session. Let your muscles rest."

Laurel made a show of tipping her head to one side and staring at Ted, sticking her gloved hands on her hips, but in fact she was ready to stop. Ted was right, she had started drifting. Thinking about Sara always did that to her. Laurel couldn't stop thinking about her sister, the hardships she had faced after she was lost at sea, and how she had ended up, shot full of arrows and sent tumbling off a building to her death.

"Do you want to get something to eat?" said Ted as he held the rope up for Laurel to step through and jump down on to the concrete floor of the gym. Ted followed suit.

"I have some papers to read before court tomorrow. I'll grab something on the way home. Maybe next time?" said Laurel, glancing quickly at Ted and giving him a short smile as she walked over to pick up her sports bag and slip on her zip up hoodie.

"No worries," said Ted as Laurel held up a hand in a wave, without turning her head to look at Ted, and headed out of the side entrance to the gym. Ted looked at the door which Laurel had exited through and paused for a moment, before he went through his regular evening ritual of turning off the lights and securing the premises, before he too grabbed some food and went home. Ted couldn't help wishing that he had company for dinner; and that the company should be Laurel Lance.

Laurel picked up some Korean burritos on the way back to her apartment; a food experience Ted Grant had introduced her to after one of their training sessions many weeks ago. Having initially turned her nose up at the mention of the combination, she was now more appreciative of their taste and their ability to help her recoup from her intense workout sessions with Ted. And though Laurel might not openly admit to it to anyone of her friends, the burritos were not the only thing Laurel was appreciative of. She could feel herself being drawn towards Ted Grant, and in those moments she recalled the advice she had given to a young and naïve Thea Queen when she had sought advice from Laurel about Roy Harper – run, run away as fast as you can.

Laurel had always been attracted to the "bad boys" growing up in Starling, as her parents found out to their dismay. The chief amongst those bad boys had been Oliver Queen who had professed to love her even when he was embarking upon an affair with her own sister; and still she had continued to love him back. And then there was Tommy Merlyn, Oliver's best friend and bad boy twin, and so the list had gone on and on with flings before, and after, Oliver and Tommy, with men who presented her with the thrill that she couldn't quite seem to find in life. And now it was happening again with Ted Grant, as she felt herself being drawn to him.

Flicking over another page of the report she was reading for the deposition tomorrow, she bit into the last of her burrito and chewed happily, glancing at the words on the page, their meaning not quite sinking in to her consciousness. Her eyes glanced over to her mantelpiece over her fireplace, at the small square of white card housing an embossed invitation to an event hosted by the Mayor. The presence of Laurel Lance, Assistant DA, was requested at the Mayor's "Gala for Renewal" – and she had a plus one. As she chewed on the last of her burrito her mind wandered off into the thought of Ted Grant in a tuxedo.

The unmarked sedan carrying Rosen to his new life made easy progress through downtown Starling. Within fifteen minutes it was entering the Parkway that would take it out of the city and heading north; its destination known only to the three federal officers in the car. Michael Rosen was completely unaware of the route he was to take or the place he would end up, all he knew was that having signed the official paperwork in SCPD headquarters, he was a marked man. In providing full testimony about his years working for organised crime in Starling, he would be dependant for his safety upon the very organisations he had once made it his life's work to defraud and hide from.

Rosen shifted in his seat and tried to stretch his arms, still shackled at the wrist by the police handcuffs. He glanced to his left to the suited federal officer and held up his hands again, but the look he received from the square jawed and square bodied individual seated beside him indicated that he was going to remain in his cuffs for the rest of the journey.

Twenty minutes later, and with the bright lights of Starling far behind them, the car wound its way through the meandering forest road that would lead on to the main highway north. Tall trees on both sides of the road cast long dark shadows across the roadway, whilst a cloudy sky intermittently blotted out white light from the rising moon. Rosen rested his head against the window of the car to his right and looked out on the dark shadowing of the forest floor, interspersed with trees and the occasional fence, as the car, doing a steady fifty, ate up the miles.

"What's that? Up ahead," said the driver as he leaned forward in his seat, peering through the window. The officer next to Rosen in the back seat sat upright and leaned forward. Special Agent Morgan's eyes narrowed but she didn't move.

Ahead of them, in the middle of the road was a dark shape, a fallen tree perhaps? The driver eased up on the accelerator, slowing the car's approach to the mystery object, which made Morgan issue a reprimand.

"Stay at fifty, we've got a schedule," said Morgan, not even bothering to look at her colleague.

"Yes Ma'am," said the driver, depressing the accelerator again, the car moving back to its previous cruising speed.

The object ahead wasn't moving, and the car was now gaining upon it at speed. When the vehicle was about a hundred yards away, it became obvious to both the driver and his colleague in the rear seat that the object in the middle of the road was a body, lying prone. The driver alerted Morgan to the discovery, sweat starting to form on his upper lip as he fought the urge to reduce speed again.

"Don't slow down," said Morgan, stressing each word, as she looked out through the windscreen at the unmoving figure in the middle of the road, "run over them if you have to, but don't slow down."

The driver gripped the steering wheel, bit down on his lip and kept his eyes on the object, now only fifty, maybe forty yards away; the car bearing down fast. The driver willed the person in the road to move, so he could make an adjustment to his fatal trajectory.

When the car was no more than twenty feet away from the figure in the road, the headlights bouncing off its hair and dark clothing, there was an almighty bang and the car shuddered and swerved, the driver losing all control of the vehicle wrenched the steering wheel to the left and then right, sending the car weaving across the road, where it left the tarmac and ended up bouncing through the grass verge and finally crashed into a tree. The force of the crash deployed the front airbags into the faces of the driver and Special Agent Morgan. In the rear of the car, Rosen and his seated companion were thrown violently forward into the rear of the front seats. All four were left disorientated and winded, but it was the driver and the officer in the rear of the car that reacted quicker, and both opened the car doors nearest them and struggled out, reaching for their side arms.

Two shots rang out almost the instant that the two officers emerged from the car, both kill shots reaching their targets. The two officers fell dead to the grassland at the side of the car. In the rear of the car Rosen held his cuffed hands defensively over his head and started screaming. Morgan ignored him, and opening the door nearest her, she slipped out into a crouch on the grass, reaching for her service issue revolver, flicking off the safety. Another two shots rang out, the first smashing through the windscreen of the sedan, and the second hitting Rosen dead centre of his forehead, his voice immediately silenced.

Morgan knew there was nowhere to run. The gunman was obviously a professional and wouldn't miss if she made a sudden bolt for the dense area of trees off to her right. Her team were dead so there was no-one to provide covering fire. Morgan slipped her right hand into her trouser pocket and withdrew her mobile phone, tapping the speed dial emergency number every Federal Officer had programmed in. The call was connected instantly but the emergency operators voice was drowned out by another cacophony of gunfire aimed at the crashed sedan. Glass shattered around Morgan's head as she tried to make her voice heard through her mobile.

"Two agents down. I'm taking heavy fire. Twenty minutes outside Starling City on the northbound forest parkway. Urgent assistance requested," she yelled into the phone as more bullets hit the metal frame of the car.

"Repeat, this is Special Agent Morgan. Five Two Zero Nine Five. Requesting armed assistance...," Morgan winced in agony as a bullet tore through her shoulder and another hit her in the thigh. She dropped the phone, her remaining energy focussed on keeping her gun pointed out and towards anyone that was about to approach her. Thinking she saw a shadow or heard a noise to her right she flung herself backwards against the car, swept her arm around and fired off two shots into the trees.

The last thing she felt was a blinding pain across the left side of her head, and then nothing more.

Captain Lance was slipping on his three quarter length dark navy overcoat, aiming to grab some Chinese food on his way back to his apartment when his desk phone rang. After he'd finished the call, all thoughts of going home at a semi-reasonable hour and getting some food were completely pushed away.

Twenty minutes later and Lance and Burrows were exiting the elevator on the ICU corridor at Starling General Hospital at 8th and Walcott. Lance was about to ask a passing doctor where Special Agent Morgan's room was but it was apparent from the two armed men standing outside the room opposite the nurse's station that she was there. Lance and Burrows waked over, showed their badges and were admitted entry into the room. Morgan was awake, but delirious and in some distress, wincing or moaning every time she moved in the hospital bed. A surgeon in scrubs, a white coated doctor and three nurses were a hive of activity around her bed as they prepped Morgan for a trip to the operating room.

Lance and Burrows stayed until they saw Morgan being wheeled into the elevator at the end of the hallway. One of the Agents that had been standing outside of Morgan's hospital room when they arrived walked over to Lance and Burrows.

"The other two agents with her died instantly, Rosen too by the looks of things. Head shots, professional. Our scene of crime techs are pouring over the car right now, we should know more in a couple of hours. She's lucky to be alive," said the Agent, whose mobile phone rang and he excused himself to answer it.

"What the hell went wrong?" said Burrows under her breath.

"I don't know, but the Feds are going to be all over us looking for answers," said Lance whispering alongside Burrows. Her eyes found his, and she instantly knew their meaning.

"You think we have a leaky ship?" said Burrows, aghast at the thought.

"I really hope not. But Rosen was involved with the mob, and they have long memories and deep pockets. It wouldn't be unheard of for a cop to take a back hander," said Lance whispering, his head close to Burrows, looking into her deep hazel eyes. As if he was suddenly aware of their proximity, Lance took a step backwards and looked behind him at the Agents standing outside Morgan's room. He then turned back to Burrows.

"I'm heading back to the station, there's a few things I need to check out. I want you to hang around here for a while, see if you can pick up anything from the Feds; but go careful," said Lance. Burrows gave Lance a tight nod and watched him walk over to the elevator. The Agent was still on his mobile phone, so Burrows walked over to the water cooler just past the nurse's station and bent to get herself a drink. As she was sipping her ice cold water, she ambled along the corridor a little, glancing in through the glass of the rooms as she passed by. Three rooms down from Morgan's, Burrows stopped walking and turned to stare through the glass window of another ICU room. As if in a trance, Burrows stumbled over to the doorway of the room and looked at the battered and pitiful state of the person lying in the bed before her, wired up to machinery, a breathing tube fixed across their mouth.

It was Peter Corvelli, or what was left of him.

As Lance was exiting Starling General Hospital through the main entrance, he slipped his hand into his pocket and drew out his mobile phone. Accessing his speed dial directory he clicked to make a call to Felicity Smoak. Getting no answer, he left a voicemail message for her to call him back. As Lance reached his parked car, he dialled another number, but he had no luck in reaching the Arrow either, but chose not to leave a message this time. The final call he made was to his daughter Laurel, but again she too wasn't available, so he left her a message to call him back urgently, and he got in his car.

"Where the hell is everyone?" muttered Lance as he slipped his keys into the ignition.

Having been told by John Diggle to give Oliver a couple of hours head start in the Arrow cave that night, Roy Harper had decided to walk over a couple of blocks from his apartment to the bar where his friend Cin liked to hang out and did occasional shifts behind. Cin wasn't there, but having spent an hour there watching the cute barmaid pour drinks and make short work of any guy willing to try his luck with her, whilst chatting to some of the locals, Roy said his goodbyes and headed to Big Belly Burger to grab some dinner.

Roy figured that by the time he'd eaten a meal and walked to Verdant, perhaps spent a while talking to Thea if she wasn't too busy, it would be OK to turn up at the Arrow cave without interrupting Oliver and Felicity from whatever it was that they were doing. Roy cared for both of his friends a great deal, but couldn't help a sneaking thought entering his mind that things were definitely changing between the two of them and that wasn't always good for a team, especially a team that spent its nights getting into dangerous situations.

Just as Roy was taking his second bite of the best burger in Starling, his mobile started ringing. Roy cast a quizzical look at the display before answering.

"Sergeant Burrows. Am I in trouble?" said Roy with a hint of sarcasm as he chewed. As Burrows started talking Roy's chewing slowed and his throat turned dry.

Roy called John to tell him what Burrows had just told him about Peter Corvelli being in the intensive care unit at Starling General Hospital, and that Michael Rosen the man they had saved from the gang in the warehouse had been murdered. John had just heard the news about Rosen from Lyla, who had phoned him to tell him about the Federal transport being attacked. The incident had been picked up by ARGUS as Amanda Waller was hyper-concerned about acts of domestic terrorism with the heightened alert about their international visitors to the US and the intel on a possible attack on one of them.

"I know Oliver wanted a couple of hours space tonight, but…," said Roy to John over the phone.

"Yeah, I agree. Time to go to work," said John, as he ended the call to Roy and then phoned both Felicity and Oliver's phones, getting no answer. He left messages for both, kissed Sara goodbye, told the nanny he would probably be back very late, like tomorrow morning late, and left his apartment heading for the Foundry.

Felicity, never five feet from her mobile, had ignored the calls that came in from John and Captain Lance as she and Oliver had been otherwise engaged. When a warning alarm signalled from her workstation however, she did take notice, and despite Oliver's gentle protestations that they should ignore it for a few minutes more, she gently manoeuvred herself free from Oliver's embrace, got up from the mattress, slipped back into her dress, and barefoot, tripped over to her workstation.

Felicity shouted to Oliver to get dressed and come and see the reports that had flashed up on her monitors. Oliver pulled on his combat trousers, and walked over to Felicity, pulling on his t-shirt. The two stood looking at the reports from the SCPD and federal agencies. Grabbing her phone off of the steel workbench before her, Felicity accessed the voicemail messages from Lance and John, and relayed their messages to Oliver just as Diggle and Roy arrived through the rear entrance of the Arrow cave.

"We heard, suit up," said Oliver to Roy, and both men disappeared to get changed.

Felicity sat at her workstation, perfectly conscious that she wasn't wearing any shoes, as John came up behind her and quickly zipped up the back of her dress, an action she hadn't completed in her rush to check out the alarm sounding on her cobalt encrypted workstation.

Felicity sat still and stared ahead, a slight flush gracing her cheeks.

"Thank you," she said in a small voice.

"You're welcome," said John who abruptly cleared his throat and then pointed at the monitor in front of him.

"What's that?"

A very welcome distraction, thought Felicity as she started typing across her keyboard to access more hacked information about the attack on the federal transport.

The Arrow, with Arsenal riding pillion, brought his motorbike to a screeching halt a couple of hundred yards away from the scene of the attack on the federal transport. Once they were both off of the bike, Oliver steered it over to a bank of trees, leaning it against them, before he started running under the cover of the trees up towards the scene of the carjacking to get a better look; Roy hard on his heels.

Two SCPD cars were blocking the road heading away from Starling, with an officer stationed a hundred yards either side of the crashed car directing any traffic around the area; their lit beacon wands making them look like air traffic guides as they waved them at passing vehicles. Moving with stealth and keeping in the shadows of the tree line, Oliver and Roy edged as close as they dare to the crashed vehicle. Oliver's keen eyes took in the damage caused by the bullets, the scene of crime fluorescent numbered markers detailing the site of each bullet fired, or spent shell casing found. The whole area was sporadically lit up by the flash of the photographer's camera. The three dead men had been removed from the scene, and Morgan transported to Starling General Hospital for emergency surgery, leaving a small number of SCPD officers to guard the scene as CSI Starling got to work.

Oliver knew this was an organised and professional attack. If he had been tasked with it, it was exactly the place he would have chosen, with good cover for the attackers, a relatively small containment area, and little chance of the victims having an easy escape route. He was more than sure someone with military training had executed the attack. Oliver turned to look at Roy and indicated they should return back the way they had come. Once Oliver was sure they were both out of earshot of the crime scene, he activated his Bluetooth device.

"Felicity we need the crime scene analysis as soon as the SCPD have it," said Oliver, as he lifted his leg over the bike seat, and thumbed the ignition button as Roy leapt on the pillion seat, "we're heading back."

Oliver walked over to John the moment they entered the Arrow cave.

"It was a professional hit, organised, military tactics," said Oliver placing his bow back in its holder in the glass case at the other end of the room to Felicity's workstation. Roy walked over to Felicity and placed his bow in his glass display case and then went to stand by Felicity, marvelling as always at the speed that her fingers flew across her keyboard.

"You think this was ex Special Forces?" said John, a note of concern in his voice. Going up against crime bosses with lots of guns and no training was one thing; going up against the guys he'd trained with in the army was something else entirely.

A familiar movement caught his peripheral vision and Roy turned to look at the monitor on the far left of Felicity's workstation. Thea was leaning against the bar on the ground floor of Verdant; she tipped her head back and laughed gently. Roy felt a brief surge of affection, not having seen her so happy or relaxed in a while, but when he looked again he saw the reason for her good mood and his face fell into a scowl.

Standing close, much too close in Roy's opinion, to Thea was a man in an expensive looking suit, sipping at a drink, his head inclining towards Thea to talk into her ear; he drew his head back and Thea smiled gently. Roy drew in his lips and bit down, his brows knitting. Felicity glanced up to her left hand side and saw a muscle tense in Roy's cheek. She glanced over to the monitor and saw Thea talking to a man in the club above them.

"Who's that?" said Roy, trying to keep his tone modulated.

"No idea. Do you want me to check him out?" said Felicity, her attention back to the monitor in front of her. Diggle walked over to the pair of them to look at Felicity's monitors, and to catch sight of Thea being friendly with a stranger upstairs. John glanced at Roy and saw the look on his face.

"Looks like Thea's already doing that," muttered Roy. "Yeah, no, well if you're not busy."

"Busy?" said Felicity, as she stopped typing and swivelled her chair to stare at Roy.

Diggle threw a look of pity towards Roy and walked away over to the weapons store.

"What exactly do you think I do when you're out running around after bad guys? File my nails?" said Felicity archly.

"No, that's not….," started Roy, turning to face Felicity, a look of contrition on his face.

"Apart from keeping a constant eye on all three of you to stop you from getting killed or picked up by the SCPD, I'm hacking into encrypted police and federal databases to get the information you need out in the field. Right now I'm recalibrating our security protocols to make sure we're protected to CIA grade specifications. Oh, and later on I have to employ a fourth level algorithm in order to get the crime scene analysis that you all need," said Felicity, her voice and her body rising as she spoke. She then held up her hands, presenting her short nails to Roy for inspection.

"Sounds like checking up on this guy might be a nice diversion then," muttered Roy, pushing the boundaries with Felicity again.

Diggle suppressed a smile as Roy cocked an eyebrow at Felicity and walked away to get changed out of his Arsenal suit. Felicity closed her eyes, blew out a cleansing breath, put her hands on her hips and then opened her eyes and turned to look at her monitors. She sat down heavily in her chair and started tapping her fingers at her keypad, isolating an image of the guy talking to Thea and running it through the facial recognition software she had "borrowed" from ARGUS. By the time that Roy returned in his normal clothes, she was able to give him a short update.

"He's not a hardened criminal," said Felicity, "as far as I can tell."

"Great, good to know," said Roy.

Since he and Thea had broken up, in extreme circumstances following the machinations of Slade Wilson attacking the city and murdering Thea's mother, forcing Thea to flee Starling for a several months, Roy had found his quiet moments filled with thoughts of his ex-girlfriend. Roy had spent so long wondering how someone like her could have wanted to be with someone like him, he had barely had time to register how lucky he was before Slade, and Roy's obsession with the Arrow, had torn them apart. Now that Thea had returned to Starling, Roy found himself faced with the daily turmoil of being near the woman he loved, but unable to do anything about it.

Roy was glad that they were still in each other's lives, and he was still able to work alongside her in Verdant as one of her assistant managers, but it wasn't enough for Roy. Now there was a possibility of Thea finding happiness again, which is something he fervently wanted for her, but her happiness might be found with someone else. It was a thought that hit him like a cold blade through his chest.

Harper made his goodbyes to John and Felicity and headed out of the Arrow cave, his emotions churning inside him.

Twenty minutes later, Roy stepped out of the elevator on to the ICU corridor at Starling General Hospital, and almost walked into Sergeant Burrows. Burrows took one look at Roy Harper's face and immediately steered him down the end of the corridor to the staff room, where the SCPD and Federal officers guarding Special Agent Morgan had been allowed to use, and poured him a coffee from the percolator that seemed to be in continual use.

"I think you probably need something stronger than this before you go and see him, but coffee will have to do. Here, sit down," said Burrows indicating a couple of metal chairs by a small table in the staff room. A doctor on call was laid full length on the couch at the other end of the room, his white coat covering him like a blanket, quietly snoring.

"What happened to him?" said Roy, taking a mouthful of the hot coffee.

"Well, if we discount the possibility that he suddenly decided to go ten rounds with the World Champion my guess is he walked into the wrong part of town and met the right type of scumbag. He may also have fallen off a building. His injuries are consistent with both blunt force trauma and impact damage. I found him in an alley just off Mallet Street."

"Mallet Street? That's miles away from where he lives. Why were you looking for him there?

"Just over an hour before I found him, Peter sent me a text, random letters and numbers, which made no sense. I tried calling him back but got no answer. I contacted one of the team leaders at the community centre and they said he'd left a couple of hours earlier heading home. I had one of our tech officers check out his phone, and they triangulated a rough position using the GPS in his mobile. So, I scouted around for a few blocks and found a mobile phone, smashed beyond repair, and Peter laying in a pool of blood," said Burrows, bringing her mug up to swallow a mouthful of coffee.

Roy gritted his teeth behind his tightly closed mouth and dipped his head; he hadn't felt this angry since he had been injected with mirakuru by Slade Wilson.

"They took him for emergency surgery to release pressure on his brain from a blood clot, he has a bunch of broken bones, most of his ribs are cracked, and he may lose an eye," Burrows paused again, reigning her emotions in, "they have him in an induced coma. He's critical."

"Does his Mom know? She should be here," said Roy in a small voice, knowing how much Peter cared for his mother.

"She is here. Three floors above us on the oncology ward, undergoing her second cycle of chemo," said Burrows, "I don't think she needs to know right now, maybe when we know more, maybe when he's….."

Burrows stopped before she could finish her sentence, and Roy hung his head. He could feel the anger battling with sadness welling up inside him. He sighed out and stood up suddenly, walking out of the staff room and heading for Peter's room. Burrows followed hard on his heels.

Roy stopped short the moment he entered Peter's room, and saw the pale and bruised body lying against the crisp white sheets of the hospital bed before him, wires and tubes emerging from the boy's broken body, a steady staccato bleep from a nearby monitor the only sound in the room. Burrows entered the room behind Roy and walked to the side of Peter's bed, looking back at Harper.

"I don't want to tell his Mom anything, until he's out of the woods, or unless….the doctors say the next twenty four to forty eight hours are critical."

Roy stood was silent and staring at Peter, his life hanging by a thread. Sadness gave way to anger, and Roy gripped the end of the metal footrest of the bed. Burrows could see the anger in Roy's face.

"I don't need to have a word with you do I?" said Burrows stepping towards Harper, her voice stern.

"No," said Roy, almost in a whisper.

"Good, because the last thing this boy needs is someone he cares about raging out on to the streets trying to get rough justice. Let us do our job. I'm not letting this go Mr Harper, believe me."

Roy took one last look at Peter Corvelli and then turned and headed towards the open doorway of the hospital room, where he stopped to turn and look at Sergeant Burrows.

"The text he sent you, the one you didn't understand, what was it?" said Roy.

"Just a bunch of letters. Our techs are trying to decipher it; they think it might be code," said Burrows.

"Can you send it to me? I have a friend who's good at tech stuff," said Roy, being careful to phrase his words, aware that he and Burrows had not known each other long.

"Felicity Smoak?" said Burrows, who curled a small grin up the side of her face as she saw Roy's confused and surprised expression. "Lance confirmed what I already knew. Don't worry, your secret's safe with me. I'll send you the text."

Roy walked out of the hospital room and headed down the corridor towards the elevator. He slipped a hand into his jacket pocket and pulled out his mobile, hitting the speed dial.

"Felicity, I need you to do something for me," said Roy as the door to the elevator opened.

After Roy left Starling General Hospital he headed in the direction of his apartment in the Glades, but took a detour on route. His friend Cindy, or Cin as she preferred to be called, had a series of part-time or erratic jobs, which suited her erratic lifestyle, and one of these jobs was in a bar in the Glades. The bar was mostly frequented by bikers and people who skirted around and within the law, people like Roy Harper before he met the Arrow. Having visited it earlier that evening, Roy returned in the hope that Cin might be a customer if she wasn't working a late shift. As Roy entered the bar he was heartened to see his friend pouring bourbon into short glasses for a couple of muscle types at the bar.

"Hey Abercrombie, you don't write, you don't call," said Cin with a smirk on her face, her eyes bright with mischief.

"Hey Cin," said Roy as he approached the bar and took a seat on a bar stool. Cin looked at Roy's face and knew immediately he wasn't in the mood for games.

"What's up, you look pissed," said Cin, hooking a cold beer bottle under the metal opener attached to the edge of the bar and handing it over to Roy, a faint wisp of cold white gas emerging from the open neck of the bottle.

"Peter Corvelli," said Roy, as if no other words mattered.

"Oh yeah, I heard. Some guy was in earlier talking about it. His kid goes to the group Peter runs," said Cin, leaning towards Roy, her forearms on the bar. Roy reached out to grab the cold beer bottle, turning it on the surface of the wooden bar, but made no effort to pick it up and drink from it.

"I need you to ask around Cin, find out what you can. It's important," said Roy, who stood up and gave his friend a long stare.

"OK Abercrombie. Take it easy OK?" said Cin as she watched Roy walk away towards the exit.

Having had to vacate their temporary accommodation in the condemned building in the Glades after the kid had unexpectedly surprised them, the woman and her accomplice had hastily packed all their equipment and weapons into their black van and had driven to another area of Starling City. It had always been their plan to move location before the final part of the plan commenced, but bringing forward their timetable had been unfortunate.

The woman sat on an upturned packing crate in the lock up garage a few blocks from where they had ignominiously dumped Peter Corvelli and sipped at a take away Styrofoam cup of jasmine tea. Her accomplice sat on another packing crate nearby jabbing wooden chopsticks at his box of Chinese food, but not lifting any of the steaming noodles towards his mouth. He glanced over at his associate, and seemed ill at ease, shifting slightly on the crate. He had been out on a fact finding mission for the woman and had decided to swing past their new hideout with an update and some food before he headed back out again. There was also something on his mind that he wanted to talk to her about.

"I haven't seen you like that in a while," he said, looking down at his carton of food, "you were out of control."

The woman didn't reply, but acknowledged her associate's words with a glance in his direction.

"The kid's in intensive care, the prognosis isn't good, but….," said her accomplice quietly.

"There's a chance he may wake up and talk," said the woman, her tone neutral, "Don't worry, I've got it covered."

 **Chapter Four**

The woman, dressed as a nurse in pale blue scrubs, stepped out of the elevator on the ICU floor at Starling General Hospital, and headed up along the corridor towards the nurse's station, slowing her walk as she did so to glance into the room containing Peter Corvelli. The woman noticed he had a female visitor, who looked vaguely familiar, and had a momentarily unsettling feeling. She then carried on walking down the corridor, carrying a small plastic tray of medical equipment in her hands.

A nurse sat at the desk that overlooked the corridor stood up and turned around to place a small paper file on the desktop behind her. By the time that she had returned to her original seat, the woman had walked passed and was heading into Special Agent Morgan's room. Dressed as a nurse, wearing correct staff ID, and bearing a tray with blood bottles and a syringe, she breezed past the federal officer standing guard outside Morgan's room, receiving a nod to her smile of greeting.

Once the door to Morgan's room closed, the woman's smile immediately dropped.

Morgan stirred in the bed, and slowly opened her eyes. Her eyes widened when she saw the woman, who slowly approached the side of the bed, and deposited the tray on the bed side table.

"What are you doing here?" said Morgan in a tense whisper.

"Taking blood, keep still or it'll hurt," said the woman, and she tied a rubber tourniquet around Morgan's upper arm, swabbed the soft area around the arm joint, inserted a needle and extracted a small amount of blood into one of the blood bottles.

"You took things a little too far don't you think?" said Morgan, throwing a hard look at the woman.

"It had to be convincing, or your position would be questioned," said the woman.

"I had emergency surgery!"

"Stop whining, you're fine," said the woman, who tightly squeezed hold of Morgan's arm as she removed the tourniquet, making Morgan wince.

"The kid in the room down the corridor from you got in our way. He's unlikely to wake up. For all our sakes, he mustn't wake up," said the woman coolly, "He's got a visitor; I can't get in there."

"What am I supposed to do, trot down the corridor and smother him?!" said Morgan, hissing with indignation.

"How you deal with the situation is your business. Just make sure it's taken care of. I can't risk returning in case I'm recognised," said the woman, who gave Morgan a level stare and then picked up her tray and walked over to the door, opening and stepping through without taking her leave or glancing at Morgan.

Morgan thrust her head back on her pillows, looked up at the ceiling, gritted her teeth and clenched her fists, wondering at the series of events that had led her to this point, and how the hell she was going to extract herself from them.

Further down the corridor, Burrows stood up from the chair that she had been in next to Peter Corvelli's bedside and arched her back. She hadn't seen any movement from him, not one twitch in all the time she had been sitting at his side. She had watched the monitors, willing the coloured line of his heart trace to keep beating, and listening out for any new sound in the monotonous staccato of the electronic monitoring keeping him alive. She was hungry and tired and she should go home and get a few hours' sleep before her next shift, but for some reason she couldn't leave Peter's bedside. From the moment that Roy Harper had introduced them the kid had got under her skin, and to see him like this was eating away at her.

Burrows knew that she was wasting time, that she needed to be out looking for the thug that put Peter in this hospital bed, but she also knew that with his only relative, his mother, not being aware of his plight, that someone should be with him at his bedside. Burrows consoled herself that along with her team at the SCPD, Roy Harper and his crime fighting colleagues would be on the case, and if what Captain Lance said was right, probably far better placed to track the culprit down in double quick time.

A nurse emerged from Morgan's room several yards down the corridor as Burrows stepped out of Corvelli's room, heading towards the staff room coffee machine. For an instant the nurse stood looking at Burrows before she turned and walked off towards the end of the corridor where there was a door leading to the emergency stairwell, carrying a small plastic tray. Burrows was slightly bemused by the encounter, but turned in the other direction, heading for the staff room. After taking a few steps she thought she would ask at the nurse's station if she could get them some coffee.

As Burrows approached the nurse's station she heard one nurse exclaim to another that she was late for taking observations on Morgan.

"I wouldn't worry, a nurse just checked on her a minute ago," said Burrows.

"I don't think so, I'm the nurse on shift for that patient tonight," said the wide-faced nurse behind the desk, grabbing hold of her small plastic tray and heading for Morgan's room.

Burrows gut turned over. She raced for Morgan's room, pulling out her pistol from its back holder, shouting at the guard at Morgan's door that there was a problem. The two of them, guns drawn, barrelled into the room, with two nurses watching wide eyed behind them at the sudden turn in events. As they entered the room, Morgan came awake with a start.

"What?!" she said.

"Are you OK?" said Burrows, as she quickly scanned the room, the federal officer sweeping the room with his drawn hand gun.

"Apart from being rudely woken up I'm fine. What's going on?" said Morgan.

Burrows ignored the question, told the federal officer to stay and watch over Morgan, before running out of the room and along the corridor towards the stairwell. There was probably no chance that she would catch up with the "fake" nurse with such a head start, but she had to try. Taking the steps as quickly as she could, she tore down three flights of stairs, before she came across the discarded medical tray. Burrows tore open the stairwell door, her gun clasped in both outstretched hands as she looked out into the corridor. It was quiet, and there was no sign of anyone moving around. Burrows decided to head down the stairs again, thinking that the assailant was looking for the quickest route out of the building and may have left the tray there to distract anyone following into thinking that she had disappeared along the corridor on that floor.

Burrows reached the ground floor a few minutes later, and ran out of the stairwell scanning the area outside, which was near to the rear entrance of the hospital. Seeing the gun in her hand a nearby Security guard raised a hand, palm out, and issued a warning, but Burrows simply held her SCPD badge up in reply.

"Has a nurse passed this way anytime in the past five minutes, dark hair, about five nine," barked Burrows at the Security guard.

"We just had a change in shift, about a dozen women like that just headed outside," said the guard.

Burrows cursed under her breath and charged out of the rear glass entrance to the hospital and into the cold night air beyond, her eyes looking out on to the car park that abutted the hospital. There were a few people getting into and out of cars, but no-one in a nursing uniform. Burrows dropped her sidearm, still gripping it tightly in her right hand.

"Anything I can do to help officer?" said the security guard, who appeared at her side.

"Do you have a control room? I need to check CCTV," said Burrows charging back into the hospital on the heels of the security guard, and reaching for her mobile phone to call Captain Lance.

Roy headed back to the Foundry instead of going to his apartment as originally planned. Still reeling from seeing poor Peter Corvelli lying in his hospital bed in the ICU ward at Starling General, Roy was now focussed on getting Felicity to help decode the text message that Sergeant Burrows had sent to him. Knowing that his sole concern was hunting down Peter's attackers, Roy headed into Verdant to ask Thea Queen for a couple of nights off, or at least a change in the rota. The club was at full capacity and very noisy as he stepped through the entrance door and scanned the room looking for Thea. Roy sighed when he caught sight of her. She was still by the bar talking to the man in the expensive suit; it was as if she hadn't moved in the intervening hours.

Roy purposefully strode through the room, weaving through the dancing clubbers and nearly tipping over a tray of drinks being carried by one of the waitresses. Roy's catlike reflexes steadied the tray before it could fall crashing to the floor, leaving the startled waitress wondering at the save one of her bosses had just pulled off.

As Roy approached Thea, there was a brief look of concern that crossed her face before she smiled and greeted him. Though the man in the suit looked at Roy, Harper didn't pay him the same favour; which Thea noticed.

"Could I have a word," said Roy above the pounding music being played by the house DJ.

"Sure. Roy, this is Tyler Barnes. Tyler, Roy Harper. Roy's one of the assistant managers here. Tyler's thinking of hiring the club for a….."

"Yeah that's great. Thea I need to talk to you," said Roy cutting off Thea, and ignoring the slightly outstretched hand of the man in the suit. Thea shot a look at Roy, smiled gently at Tyler and allowed herself to be steered further up the bar away from Mr Barnes.

"Roy, what the hell?" said Thea, her back now to Tyler, her expression one of anger directed at Harper.

"I'm sorry, I'm kinda pushed for time. Can I get a couple of nights off, or can you just change the rota. There's something I have to do," said Roy, "it's important."

Thea could see that Roy had something urgent on his mind, she'd seen this look on his face before, and knew him well enough to know that once he set his mind on something there was no moving him. Thea assumed it had something to do with the Arrow, for she knew that Roy was the masked sidekick in red leather that worked alongside him, so she had no problem with trying to help accommodate his erratic work schedule when she could, but she drew the line at the kind of behaviour she'd just witnessed.

"Fine," said Thea, "but don't do that again. This guy could put some serious business my way," said Thea. Roy looked over to where Tyler Barnes was standing, looking out over the crowd, sipping his drink, and Roy just knew the guy was all kinds of wrong. How he was supposed to alert Thea to this without sounding like a jealous idiot was beyond him. Thea saw the look Roy was giving Tyler and she stepped in front of Roy blocking off his view of Barnes.

"What is it with you tonight?" said Thea, her brows knitting in concern.

"Look, I don't want to come over like a jealous ex-boyfriend," said Roy.

"Too late."

"But he looks like he's only after one thing."

"Thanks!"

"Sorry, I didn't mean….," Roy sighed and went to step away. Thea grabbed hold of his wrist and gently pulled him back.

"What's up?" she said pointedly but in a soothing tone to Roy, looking him in the face.

"I'm just worried about a friend in hospital," sighed Roy, looking into Thea's warm dark eyes.

"Who? Is it Cin?"

"No, she's fine. It's this kid I know, Peter, he got badly beat up," said Roy.

"I'm sorry. How do you know him?"

"I ran into him one night and stopped him from doing something stupid," said Roy, a small wistful smile creeping up the side of his face.

"Ran into him as…?" Thea left the sentence hanging but Roy instantly understood her meaning.

"No, he doesn't know what I do," said Roy, "but I need to go and be that guy in order to find the person who did this to him."

"Be careful," said Thea as she squeezed Roy's wrist before letting it go.

"I could say the same to you," said Roy looking towards Tyler Barnes, before he looked at Thea and then headed for the exit of Verdant.

Downstairs in the Arrow cave, Oliver, Felicity and John were standing around Felicity's workstation when Roy walked into the room. Having called Felicity from the hospital about the text message, Roy had immediately relayed it to his "tech friend" when Burrows had sent it to him.

"Any luck?" said Roy to Felicity as he approached her workstation.

"Not yet," said Felicity, as she carried on typing at her keyboard, "I don't think it's a standard code, at least not one I'm familiar with. There's a chance it's not complete, in which case it'll take a hell of a lot longer to decipher. I'm running it through a variety of programmes, as soon as I find the key we can work out what Peter was trying to say."

Felicity looked at Roy, trying to give him reassurance and comfort, but seeing how agitated he looked, she knew she was on a hiding to nothing; only finding the translation of Peter's text message would give Roy any comfort right now.

"Things looked a bit tense with you and Thea," said Felicity gently. Roy looked at the monitor on the far left of the workstation and realised that the conversation he'd just had with his ex-girlfriend had been watched by the three of them.

"He calls himself Tyler Barnes," said Roy.

Oliver cleared his throat and looked at Roy.

"Roy I know you're worried about your friend, but you know we're doing all we can. Don't lose sight of your focus," said Oliver calmly, "Felicity will let us know when something shows up. In the meantime, we carry on as normal. ARGUS has intel on a possible assassination and we need to look into the attack on the Federal transport earlier, OK?"

Roy looked at Oliver, his mouth open as if to say something, but then he breathed and nodded his head in the affirmative.

"Good. Now go home, get some rest," said Oliver, who stood motionless and watched Roy turn and walk towards the rear entrance of the Arrow cave before he turned to Felicity.

"The second you get anything call Diggle or me first," said Oliver.

"You're worried about what Roy might do?" said Diggle.

Oliver looked at John without answering, but Diggle knew from his friend's expression that Roy's reaction was exactly what was on his mind.

The next morning Felicity was in her office on the thirty-ninth floor of the Palmer Technologies headquarters building in downtown Starling trying to concentrate on a particularly vexing problem that her boss Ray Palmer had presented to her virtually the moment she stepped into her office. Felicity liked a technological challenge, and mysteries bugged her, so she was very content to work on Ray's IT issue even though she had a queue of other work to be getting on with as Vice President of a multi-national corporation. Or she would have been content to get on with Ray's IT issue if he didn't keep popping into her office to give her updates to his original request. On the third such occasion Felicity gave him one of her over the top of her glasses looks which in his experience meant he should offer to buy her a coffee and get out of her office.

With Ray gone on a caffeine run, Felicity sighed and closed her eyes, appreciating the peace and quiet. And then her PA Jerry walked into the office.

"Sorry to disturb you Miss Smoak but the Mayor's office is checking on acceptances for this evening," said the pleasant and neat young man as he walked towards her desk.

"This evening?" said Felicity, mystified.

"The Gala for Renewal. You received an invite a couple of days ago, it's on your desk," said Jerry, his eyes searching over the mound of paper littering the area, "somewhere."

Felicity started picking up bits of paper and shuffling them to one side, and there underneath one pile of notes left by Ray, some written on napkins, was the small embossed card bearing her invitation, plus one, to the event at City Hall. Felicity's thoughts immediately turned to what to wear and who to take. Unbidden and instantly her thoughts turned to her night with Oliver, and she blushed a little at the memory.

"Are you OK Miss Smoak? You look a little flushed," said Jerry, his expression one of concern.

Felicity cleared her throat louder than she had intended to, assured her Executive Assistant she was fine and asked him to accept the invitation, plus one. Then she picked up her mobile and dialled Oliver.

When Oliver answered he was panting slightly, being mid-way through his morning training routine with John and Ray, the sound of which did little to reduce the colour in Felicity's cheeks. Having explained the purpose of her call, and extending the invite to him to be her plus one, she was half expecting Oliver to say the team were all too busy to go socialising, so Felicity was pleasantly surprised when Oliver agreed instantly to the invitation and organised to meet her outside City Hall at 8.00pm.

Felicity beamed broadly as she ended the call to Oliver, her mind still slipping back to the previous evening, and she lost herself in a very pleasant and erotic reverie; which was rudely interrupted by Ray Palmer bounding into the office with her take-away latte. So rudely in fact that she sat bolt upright and dislodged a pile of notes off her desk and on to the floor of her office.

"So I was wondering about tonight, the Gala," said Ray raising an eyebrow," Jerry said you hadn't accepted."

"I have, just now," said Felicity, reaching down to the floor to retrieve her spilled paperwork.

"Oh good, well shall we go together, I can pick you up in my limo," said Ray, smiling.

"Oh, um, thanks but I've kind of arranged to go with someone," said Felicity, pushing her glasses back up her nose, "old friend."

"Ahh, right, no problem," said Ray, his positive intentions a little crushed, "I can pick you and your girlfriend up if you like?"

"It's not a girlfriend," said Felicity quietly, caught between stating, and skirting around, an explanation.

"Right, good, yes," said Ray as he started slowly backing away from Felicity's desk, and clapped his hands together, "well I've got things to be doing, so I'll see you later."

Felicity almost winced with agony at Ray's discomfort. It had always been somewhat apparent that Ray Palmer liked her, and she found him very likeable in return, but with her relationship with Oliver having now taken a huge leap forward she was conscious that she needed to be more careful around Ray in case he misconstrued her genuine appreciation of his ideas and her love of working alongside him, with anything other than professional and friendly interest.

Laurel, dressed in one of her professional business suits and carrying her briefcase, stepped out of the main entrance to Starling City County Courthouse. She turned her face to the weak spring sunshine, closed her eyes and breathed out a long breath. It had been something of a trying morning in Judge Michaels' chambers. Michaels was a career lawyer and on the fast track to head the Bar Council, if he didn't get side-tracked into the race for the Senate. He was also one of the most contentiously pompous and procedure driven lawyers she had ever come across. Laurel knew her case was strong, even the attorney for the defence had admitted as such in an aside, but what could easily have been a thirty minute process had dragged on for three hours as Michaels' crossed every "t", twice, and dotted every "i", three times.

Stepping across the street and heading down Jefferson and 8th, Laurel stopped off at a coffee shop, picked up a non-fat skinny latte, and feeling in the mood to walk a little in the fresh air after being cooped up in Michaels' chamber, she stepped along the sidewalk in the rough direction of the DAs building in downtown Starling. As she walked in the sunshine, sipping at her coffee, Laurel's thoughts turned away from paperwork and deadlines and more towards how much she was looking forward to her next training session with Ted Grant.

"Damn," said Laurel suddenly, realising that the Gala for Renewal was this evening, that she was invited, and that even though she'd decided that she would ask Ted to go, she hadn't actually got round to asking him.

Looking up and down the street she saw a cab approaching, and she flagged it down, asking to be taken to the Wildcat Gym in the Glades.

Ted Grant thought he was punching well above his weight, and he assumed his luck would run out at some point, it always did. As he circled the boxing ring, shielding his face with his gloved hands, and fending off substantial punches thrown by his opponent, he tried to focus on anything except the thought that seemed to be filling his every waking moment just recently; Laurel Lance.

Ted had known some pretty good looking women in his time, and had even trained with a few in his gym, but there was something about Laurel Lance that set her apart from any other woman he had ever met. She was beautiful, determined, successful, and loved to train; too much sometimes he thought. And on top of all that she was probably the most intelligent woman he'd ever met. Oh and she had a father that was one step away from hating him and had the power to lock him up if the mood struck him. Although to Ted, the thought of dating an intelligent woman was more of a scary prospect that being hunted down by Captain Lance of the SCPD. When Ted thought of all the "smart suits" that Laurel must meet every day at work, he had little hope that their relationship would extend any further than one of trainer and student.

Grant dodged and weaved and jigged about the canvas as he parried punch after punch from the six foot man mountain in the ring with him. The guy was an up and coming young fighter who Ted had seen progress from the junior ranks, and was one or two successful fights short of a shot at a major East Coast bout. Ted knew he was a good fighter, but he was still lacking some experience so was quick to downplay the guy's Manager's claims of a title fight at the Rockets Arena within the year. Ted held up his gloves against his face and nodded at his opponent, indicating that they should take a break. Each retreated to their water bottles and towels, spat out their mouth guards, and allowed their breathing to regulate. Ted stood listening as the guy's manager started up with his big talk and rolled his eyes. Grant was just about to open his mouth and say something when Laurel appeared ring side, prompting a wolf whistle from one of the men training over by the weights; Ted shot the guy a warning look.

"You're way early for our session," said Ted leaning on the top rope of the ring and looking down at Laurel, "like six hours early."

"That's what I came to talk to you about," said Laurel looking around her at the interest she was garnering, "perhaps somewhere with less eyes?"

Ted grinned, and stepped through the ropes, jumping down on to the concrete floor, before holding out an arm indicating Laurel should head into his small office adjacent to the boxing ring. It was called an office, but it was more like a glorified broom cupboard hosting a cork pin board littered with boxing posters, a grey metal filing cabinet and a desk, its width bookended by two wooden chairs. Once the two of them were inside the small space, Ted pushed the door to, but not closed, and the noise from the gym became muffled.

"I meant to call earlier but I can't train tonight," said Laurel.

"No problem, we'll reschedule," said Ted, using his towel to wipe the sweat forming on the back of his neck.

"There's this thing the Mayor's hosting and I'm representing the DAs office, and I can't get out of it," said Laurel, stepping over to the pin board to look at the nearest poster.

"Well that's what you get paid the big bucks for I guess," said Ted, moving over to the desk to perch on its edge. Laurel turned to look at him, and he could feel heat growing in the centre of his chest. Why don't I just ask her out on a date, right now? Ted reasoned that it wasn't as if he hadn't thought of asking her a dozen times before, but he'd always pulled away from committing at the last moment, which wasn't his style. Ted held Laurel's gaze, waiting for her to speak, hoping that his courage would assert itself. He had no idea of the effect his close presence and assured look was having on the object of his affections.

"So, as we're not training this evening, and as I have a plus one, I was wondering if you would like to go with me?" said Laurel. Ted heard her speak, and knew what the sentence meant, but he seemed to be taken aback by the fact that Laurel was asking him out on a date. There was a pause before he responded, which Laurel interpreted as Ted trying to frantically figure out an excuse to turn down her offer.

"If it's not your kind of thing, no problem, I…..," said Laurel, trying to cover for any embarrassment they both might feel.

"No," said Ted pushing himself off of the table to stand directly in front of Laurel, "I mean yes. Yes, I'll go with you."

"Great," said Laurel, in a tone of happy relief, "why don't you meet me outside the Grand Hotel at eight o'clock? It's black tie by the way."

"Of course it is," said Ted with a grin. "Eight o'clock, I'll be there."

Laurel graced Ted with one of her wide warm smiles, and walked over to the office door, opening it, and then walking across the gym. Ted watched her as she headed over to the side entrance of the building, seeing a few men casting appraising looks in her direction, and felt his chest swell.

Maybe this dumb fighter's luck isn't going to run out this time, thought Ted.

Oliver could not but help notice that Roy was distracted. The young man's reaction times were slow throughout the daily training session that Oliver conducted in the Arrow cave, and he seemed unable to focus. John caught him a glancing blow across the shoulder with a swipe from a wooden training stick that Roy would normally, and easily, have swerved to avoid, and Oliver had to hang back a few punches. Roy shrugged his shoulders and said he was fine upon Oliver asking him about his lack of determination in their practice session; the look that Diggle and Oliver shared confirmed their mutual acknowledgement that Roy was anything but fine.

Having received the phone call from Felicity asking him to attend the Mayor's Gala with her, Oliver went to look amongst his boxed possessions in a darkened alcove of the Arrow cave. Everything that Oliver could call his own was removed to the Foundry after the Queen family home was sold after Queen Consolidated was taken from him by the machinations of Slade Wilson over a year ago. Twenty minutes later, Oliver emerged with a hanger bearing his only, if somewhat expensively tailored, black dinner suit.

"Nice, but I think you're other one is more practical," said Diggle as he tipped his head towards the glass case where Oliver Queen kept his Arrow suit.

Oliver graced his friend with a short tight smile.

"Practical it may be, but the invitation says black tie, not green leather," said Oliver, as he hooked the suit hanger over the thin handle of one of the metal equipment cabinets.

"Invitation?" said Diggle as he sipped at a mug of coffee.

"The Mayor's Gala for Renewal. Tonight," said Oliver, "I'm Felicity's plus one."

"Snap," said Diggle.

Oliver threw Diggle a curious look, his brows knitting.

"Felicity asked you as well?"

"No, I'm Lyla's plus one," said Diggle, "Waller has her shadowing some international businessman. He's been invited to the Gala, and so has she. So you're not the only one who's going to be uncomfortable in a suit."

Diggle drained the rest of his coffee and stood up from the metal workbench that he had been leaning against as Roy appeared from the rear of the Arrow cave. He had walked around the block and then paid a visit to Verdant night club above as he thought he might try and apologise to Thea for his behaviour the other night. Thea however was not there to be apologised to as she had left one of her other assistant managers in charge as she had a ticket to the Mayor's Gala that night and had gone shopping for a dress. John and Oliver exchanged another look as they saw Roy's miserable expression.

"I have a suit to pick up from the dry cleaners and a daughter that needs my attention," said Diggle reaching for his leather jacket and slipping it on, "I'll see you later."

Roy glanced over at the suit hanging up near Oliver, and turned to look back at John as he exited the Arrow cave rear exit, his brow furrowed in curiosity.

"Suit?"

"Dig and I are plus one's for the Mayor's Gala tonight," said Oliver walking over to Roy and gently lowering his voice, "so that gives you a few hours off. Which I think, is a good thing."

Roy dipped his head and sighed quietly, then raised it and looked at Oliver.

"I'm fine," said Roy with firmness, but not as determinedly as he had hoped.

"I think you're doing the best you can when your head is obviously elsewhere," said Oliver, his tone growing more affirmative, "and I also think that what happened to Peter Corvelli has hit you harder than you think."

"Perhaps if I'd….," started Roy, but Oliver held up a hand and cut him off.

"You are not to blame for him being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The best thing you can do for him right now is focus. We will find out who did this, and they will face justice," said Oliver, placing his upheld hand gently on the top of Roy's shoulder.

"I guess I'll go visit Cin, she if she's heard anything," said Roy, trying to be practical, his emotions churning inside him.

"Fine. But if she has information you bring it back here and we deal with it together. No solo heroics, understood?" Oliver leaned his head down and looked deep into Roy's eyes. The younger man nodded his assent.

Later, as night fell over Starling City, Team Arrow, minus one, struggled into their rarely used evening attire. Fingers poked at collars, pulled at jackets, and smoothed down hosiery as Felicity, John and Oliver layered themselves in material designed for presentation, not comfort and practicality.

Felicity's bed had an increasing pile of clothing on it as she held one dress after another up before her in front of the mirror, only to discard it, or pick it up again, before she finally found the one that met the right criteria. This was after all, though it was dressed up as a work event, a date night with Oliver Queen, and she was determined to look her best.

In a less frenetic sense than Felicity, Laurel Lance was also working her way through her wardrobe, making sure she chose the right outfit for her date night with Ted Grant. Finally, holding up one floor length blue dress against herself in the mirror she made her choice, highly conscious that the clock was ticking against her if she was going to get to the Gala on time.

The Jones woman crouched on the floor and packed several weapons and pieces of military equipment into her backpack as her accomplice slipped in to his designer suit. The pair were in a hideout in a newly built, and currently vacant, office block in downtown Starling. Having left their temporary lock up garage hideout they had been using earlier that day, they had been moving every eight hours since the boy had stumbled upon them in the condemned building in the Glades.

"How do I look?" he said as he stood before her, his hands outstretched, an eyebrow raised in comic question.

The woman glanced up at him briefly before she returned her focus back to checking her hand gun.

"You look appropriate," she said.

"Tough room," muttered her accomplice as he checked his tie was straight against his reflection in a nearby glass door, "I would wish you good luck, but I know you won't need it."

After her accomplice had vacated the cavernous open plan office space they had occupied on the second floor of the building, she checked one final time to make sure there was no trace of their presence in the room, before she too exited the building. She walked around the block to the black van she had parked there a few hours ago, and slipped into the driver's seat placing her backpack on the passenger seat beside her. She checked her watch. As always, she was right on time.

 **Chapter Five**

Oliver jogged the last few metres to the Grand Hotel. He was late. He was always late, so Felicity wasn't overly concerned when he didn't show at eight o'clock. As he ran towards her in his black tuxedo and bow tie, she tried to keep her emotions in check, but she could feel herself getting warm; she hoped by the time that Oliver reached her she wasn't completely red in the face.

"Sorry," said Oliver as he indicated towards his watch, as if it was to blame for his tardiness.

"Why break the habit of a lifetime," said Felicity, indicating towards the hotel entrance, "shall we?"

Oliver and Felicity walked into the hotel lobby and were directed along with a couple of other latecomers towards the entrance to the grand ballroom. Felicity went off into an anteroom to check in her overcoat, and emerged a couple of minutes later to Oliver's warm appraisal of her as she walked towards him. Felicity was wearing a floor length, figure hugging black dress, slashed across the shoulder exposing the bare skin of her left shoulder and arm. Her ice blonde hair was pulled up and away from her face, and fell in long soft waves down her back. Oliver breathed in gently, his chest swelling, as Felicity came closer.

Oliver stepped forward and took hold of Felicity's hand, hooking her right arm around the crook of his left arm as he guided her towards the ballroom. A string quartet was playing on a raised dais adjacent to the entrance to the room. Felicity and Oliver looked around the room, the former marvelling at the opulence on display, the latter searching for trusted faces.

Oliver's keen eyes, with years of practice of scouting busy public areas for one or another of the targets that Waller wanted liquidated, immediately spotted Diggle over the far side of the room, a few feet away from Lyla, who was in turn watching an individual a few feet from her like a hawk. Oliver glanced at the object of Lyla's attention, an Asian middle aged man with short black hair, in a black dinner suit and red tie, and made a note of his appearance. Oliver also spotted Thea standing talking to the man they had all viewed on the monitor in the Arrow cave yesterday, the stranger from Verdant that had irked Roy.

"You look nice," said Felicity as they stopped after a few paces, turning her face to look up at Oliver.

"You look..," breathed Oliver before he was cut short as Laurel, her arm through Ted Grant's, walked over to them.

For a brief moment all four of them stood looking at each other, before Oliver said hello to Laurel and stepped forward to give her a light, one-armed hug. Felicity and Laurel smiled at each other, a degree of mild awkwardness apparent, but not enough to make Ted or Oliver notice anything.

"I think you both remember Ted Grant," said Laurel.

"Yes," said Oliver giving Ted a level look before holding out his hand. The look and gesture was reciprocated by Grant and the two men shook firmly.

Oliver held a hand up to stop a passing waiter, and lifted two glasses of champagne off of the man's serving tray, handing one to Felicity, and offering one to Ted.

"I won't, thanks," said Ted.

Oliver nodded at the waiter in thanks, and kept the glass of champagne for himself. Oliver knew intimately about Laurel's battle with alcohol and had therefore not offered her a glass, but in doing so, and with none of the others having commented on his actions, it was obvious to everyone in that small group that they all knew each other incestuously well.

The ballroom was opulent and designed in a neo-classical style, with a high ornate ceiling, faux marble walls and a heavily polished dark wooden floor. Lit chandeliers sparkled in the white plaster ceiling as the great and the rich of Starling City glided about the room in their finery, jewels twinkling and smiles wide. The Mayor walked about shaking hands with as many people as he could, flanked by what was obviously a trusted aide from the way he kept whispering in the Mayor's ear each time he approached someone to glad hand. A large square man with a stern expression shadowed both the Mayor and his aide, looking uncomfortable in his neatly pressed suit, his eyes fixed on any threat approaching the Mayor's presence. The Mayor gave an equally determined look at the same people, sizing them up not as a threat, but as a potential business opportunity for Starling, and therefore himself.

Once Laurel and Ted had excused themselves to go and talk to the head of the Bar Council, Oliver and Felicity clinked glasses and sipped at their champagne. Felicity thought the one she and Oliver had drunk on the roof of another hotel twenty-four hours ago tasted better, but was that just because it had been the precursor to their night together that had made that wine taste sweeter? Oliver looked at Felicity, his eyes warm with emotion.

"I didn't get to finish my sentence," said Oliver taking a step closer to Felicity, "you look….."

Oliver was cut short again by Thea walking over to greet Oliver, her new "friend" in tow. Thea clapped Oliver lightly on the shoulder and smiled.

"Hey how did you bag a ticket for this? They do know you're not a billionaire anymore right?" said Thea, her tone light and sarcastic.

Oliver gave her a tight smile, "Cute."

The siblings gave each other a warm hug.

"This is Tyler Barnes. Tyler this is my brother Oliver, and his…..," Thea looked from Oliver to Felicity and back again, unsure of the correct word to use; ex-assistant, friend?

"Date," said Felicity a she held out her hand for Tyler to shake, "Felicity Smoak, hello."

In the brief pause that followed the last sentence, Thea turned and raised a smile and an eyebrow towards her brother, and Oliver gave his sister a pointed look in reply.

"Tyler runs a big advertising company. He's interested in hiring Verdant for a series of product launches," said Thea, in her best business tones.

That's not the only thing he's interested in, thought Felicity as she observed Barnes looking at Thea. The look was almost intense, possessive, and it made Felicity feel uncomfortable.

"Good," said Oliver with more enthusiasm than he felt, "that's great."

The two men looked at each other, and though Oliver's expression was neutral, Felicity felt the tension emanating from him. She glanced up at Oliver's face to see the glint of steel in his eyes that was normally reserved for his opponents when he was dressed as the Arrow. Barnes held that gaze and did not shrink from its power. Felicity knew she had been right to feel uncomfortable about the way Tyler was looking at Thea.

"There are some people I'd like you to meet," said Barnes, cupping his hand under Thea's elbow and steering her away from Felicity and Oliver, "Excuse us."

"You, don't like him," said Felicity archly as she and Oliver watched Thea and her new friend walk further in to the busy ballroom.

John Diggle, dressed in an immaculately tailored dinner jacket and bow tie, his trousers pressed and shoes shined to military precision, walked over to Oliver and Felicity.

"It's like a works outing in here, we should get a group photo for this year's Team Arrow Christmas card," muttered Diggle sarcastically. Felicity dipped her head and stifled a smile, before she retrieved her mobile phone from her small dress bag and started tapping away.

John tugged down on the front of his jacket and slipped a finger into the neck of his shirt, pulling it lightly away from his skin. He glanced over to the other side of the room to where Lyla Michaels was standing, looking beautiful, but John knew similarly uncomfortable, in her formal three quarter length dress. Lyla glanced over at John, widened her eyes at him briefly and smirked as if to say, "will you stop watching me, I have work to do!"

"Was that…?" said Diggle indicating with his head towards Thea and her new companion.

"The guy from Verdant, yeah," said Oliver, not having taken his eyes off of Thea since she walked away with Barnes, "Felicity…"

"I'm already on it," said Felicity tapping at her phone, "I'm checking all US advertising companies registered with associations or federations, and just in case I'm running his name through a few databases held by state and federal law enforcement agencies."

"Thank you," said Oliver quietly and warmly, his affection for Felicity running parallel to his pride at her abilities.

"Oh you really don't like him," said Diggle archly.

"Apparently it's obvious," muttered Oliver, who continued to look at Thea and her companion whilst raising his glass to take another sip of champagne.

Whilst the Mayor was glad-handing one-percenters in downtown Starling, Roy Harper stepped into a bar in a less salubrious part of town and weaved his way through the clientele to reach his friend Cin who was sitting nursing a beer bottle at the counter.

"Hey Abercrombie, want one?" said Cin holding up her beer bottle.

"Sure," said Roy, taking a seat on the wooden stool next to her. Cin held up her bottle to the bearded barman and hooked her head towards Roy. A few seconds later and the old friends clicked the necks of their beer bottles and took a long draught each.

"Did you find out anything?" said Roy.

"Not much," said Cin, turning slightly to look at Roy square on, "your friend walked a couple of the boys from his group as far as Jefferson and 5th. The last they saw he was heading back down Jefferson about seven thirty that night."

Cin took a sip of her beer, and Roy followed suit.

"One of the boys said he phoned his Mom from home at eight on the dot every night, never missed a call, not by a minute. Corvelli's apartment is on Randall, he would never have made it there by eight unless he took a short cut."

"He was found in Mallet Street, but he wasn't attacked there," said Roy, "thanks Cin, it gives me somewhere to start looking."

Roy took another quick sip at his beer and then stood up.

"Hey Abercrombie, I know you can take care of yourself, but that area is dangerous. No-one goes there unless they have a reason to, and that reason is always bad. If you know the Glades you know that," said Sin a serious expression on her face, "your friend knew the Glades."

Roy nodded at Cin, thanked her for the beer and then left the bar. As he stood on the sidewalk outside and breathed in the fresh night air he thought about Peter Corvelli and his reason for walking through a dangerous area of the Glades. Was it just to find a quick route home to call his Mom, or was there another reason?

Thea Queen pushed open the door of the powder room and saw Laurel Lance applying lipstick at the long ornate mirror, and stepped over to join her.

"Hey," said Thea.

"Hey yourself," said Laurel warmly.

"So who's the new guy?" said Laurel, raising an eyebrow.

"I could say the same to you," said Thea tipping her head to one side and raising both her eyebrows at Laurel. The two women smiled conspiratorially.

"Its business," said Thea, reaching into her clutch bag for her lip gloss, "for the moment anyway. And yours?"

"It was business," said Laurel, putting her lipstick back in her purse, "but I'm not sure now."

"Why not sure?" said Thea turning to face Laurel.

"Oh a hundred reasons," sighed Laurel, "my father doesn't like him, my friends have warned me off him."

"But what do you think?" said Thea.

"I think he's a bad boy, and I have too much history with those," said Laurel, rolling her eyes and smiling tightly. Thea looked at Laurel, thought for a moment and then took a step nearer to Laurel.

"Do you remember when I asked you for your advice about dating Roy?" said Thea, thinking back to when she had paid off her debt to Laurel by working in the CNRI legal aid office a couple of years ago after her arrest for driving under the influence of drugs.

"Yes, I told you to run as far away as possible," said Laurel smiling, "but I seem to recall you didn't take that advice."

"No, I didn't," said Thea smiling, "but it did make me stop and think. I looked beyond what everyone was telling me Roy was, and I found someone I ended up caring a great deal about. I know we're not together anymore, but I don't regret my decision."

Laurel looked at Thea, listening intently to her words, and then she smiled gently.

"Thea Queen. When did you get so wise?" said Laurel.

Oliver stood, with Felicity and John, watching as first Thea and her "friend" and then Laurel and Ted Grant danced in the centre of the room with a dozen other couples in the ballroom. John excused himself and went over to the opposite side of the room to talk to Lyla, who continued to keep her eyes fixed on the visiting dignitary she was protecting. Felicity knew that Oliver didn't dance so felt no awkwardness in standing watching the other couples, but in a secret small part of her heart she would have liked to have joined them.

Ray Palmer came bounding over to say hello.

"Miss Smoak, you're not dancing?" said Ray, holding out his hand and glancing at Oliver, "you don't mind?"

"No, please," said Oliver, looking at Felicity and smiling tightly.

Oliver, a somewhat wistful expression on his face, watched as Felicity took Ray's proffered hand and was led on to the dance floor, where Palmer scooped an arm around her waist and the pair began to sway in harmony with the music. Oliver looked at Palmer, his arm around Felicity, and could tell instantly from his expression and body language that he was more than professionally happy to be that close to his Vice President, and that Felicity seemed at ease in his arms. Oliver's cheek muscle twitched.

Though Oliver was very glad that his relationship with Felicity had finally developed into something deeper and more serious, he couldn't help but think that in the great scheme of things someone like Ray Palmer would be better for Felicity. Oliver could see that Palmer liked Felicity, they had similar interests, and he was rich and could give her everything that Oliver couldn't. And there was the obvious difference in the fact that Ray Palmer didn't go out every night putting his life at risk, leaving Felicity to fret as to whether he would return.

Having left the SCPD headquarters precinct fifteen minutes earlier, Sergeant Burrows was heading towards her apartment when she suddenly turned her steering wheel and put her car in the direction of Starling General Hospital. When she emerged on to the ICU floor she was greeted with a nod from the nurse emerging from Peter Corvelli's room.

"Here again Sergeant?" said the nurse, "you and the Captain should move in here together you're here so often."

Burrows stared at the nurse, a slight blush forming on her cheeks, and then saw Captain Quentin Lance approaching down the corridor behind the healthcare worker. The nurse excused herself and went back to her station further down the hallway.

"I thought you were heading home?" said Lance.

"I was," said Burrows, marshalling her emotions, "but I just wanted to check on Corvelli."

The two police officers walked over to the doorway of Corvelli's room and stood, looking in at the almost lifeless form of the young man in the bed.

"Does your daughter know you're out after hours?" said Burrows with mild sarcasm, which Lance greeted with a pointed look.

"Morgan asked to see me," said Lance.

"What about?" said Burrows, wondering at both the reason behind Morgan's request and the urgency for it considering the hour.

"I dunno," said Lance with a shrug, "So I guess the two of us didn't get an invite to the grand gala then."

"I did actually. Morgan got invited and gave me her ticket because she ended up in here," said Burrows, "but my good dress is at the dry cleaners."

Lance graced Burrows with a tight smile and tried to keep the image of his Sergeant dressed up to the nines out of his head. Little did Lance know that Burrows was similarly trying very hard not to let her imagination run away with her over the thought the nurse had activated in her head about herself and Lance living together.

Lance nodded at Burrows and then turned and made his way up the corridor towards Special Agent Morgan's hospital room, whilst Burrows watched him for a moment before she stepped into Peter Corvelli's room to find little changed in the youngster's condition.

In the ball room of the Grand Hotel, a champagne corked popped louder than expected, causing Oliver, John and Lyla, plus the Mayor's bodyguard to flinch. John and Oliver exchanged a relieved glance with each other that it was simply exploding wine bubbles rather than anything more threatening. John looked out across the ballroom to see the dancing couples moving in time to the music and noticed Felicity in the arms of Ray Palmer. John looked across at Oliver and saw his friend's expression as he watched the couple dance several feet away from him.

Oliver briefly diverted his attention to the left hand side of the room where Thea was standing with Tyler Barnes, with the Mayor standing nearby in close discussion with a well-dressed businessman, who was unknown to Oliver. Oliver noticed that Thea's friend glanced several times in the Mayor's direction in between bending his head to speak briefly with, or smile at, Thea.

As the end of the song finished, Felicity said a few words to Ray and he walked her back over to where Oliver was standing, still holding his first glass of champagne.

"Thank you for the dance Felicity," said Ray smiling and looking warmly at her, "perhaps if your date hasn't filled the rest of your dance card I might get another chance later on?"

"Oh Oliver doesn't dance," said Felicity at the same time that Oliver said "I don't dance."

Ray looked at Felicity and then Oliver, who were both looking at each other, smiles creasing their eyes, and then cleared his throat and excused himself to go and speak to the Mayor. Oliver watched as Palmer reached, and was greeted warmly by, the Mayor who introduced him to the businessman he was speaking with. Oliver noted that Thea's companion took an active interest in these three men, glancing over at them, and imperceptibly moving close enough to overhear their conversation, whilst still engaging Thea's attention.

Felicity and Oliver stood side by side at the edge of the dance floor, Felicity sipping on a glass of champagne that Oliver had stopped a passing waiter to procure for her, her cheeks mildly flushed from her recent spin on the dancefloor, her eyes shining with contentment.

"As I tried to say twice before," said Oliver softly, tilting his head towards Felicity, "you look beautiful."

The Jones woman, dressed in the uniform of an SCPD officer, turned off the headlights and gently took her foot off the accelerator of the black van, and allowed the vehicle to roll naturally to a halt along the dirt track several hundred yards away from the rear entrance to Iron Heights Prison. Having done her research she knew that the semi-forest area adjacent to the prison was just out of range of the CCTV camera network that monitored the main approaches to the prison.

With her accomplice engaged in important reconnaissance work at the Gala for Renewal, under the guise of being an advertising executive and Thea Queen's would-be suitor, this would be a one woman mission. Though the task ahead would be dangerous for one person, she was always comfortable not having to rely on anyone else except herself.

The metal of the van creaked intermittently as the vehicle cooled down, which was the only sound to be heard as the woman sat in silence, her hand gripped around a handgun as she looked through the windscreen of the van and adjusted her eyesight to the darkness beyond.

Morgan was still seething from the injuries she incurred as part of the attack on the transport carrying Rosen, and from the woman's brazen visit to her hospital room earlier on. No-one was aware of the layers of secrets that shrouded Morgan, but the woman had threatened to pierce these layers by visiting Morgan in hospital. Her injuries, though more severe than Morgan was expecting, should cover her against any blame, or suspicions of intrigue, from her superiors or from Lance's team at the SCPD, but the visit and subsequent chase given by Burrows at Starling General wouldn't be so easy to explain away without causing suspicion to arise.

It had taken time and hard work for Special Agent Morgan to achieve the position of power and trust that had meant she was given the lead on a national taskforce battling organised crime. And now, with the woman almost having been caught leaving her room, and with the recent timing of the attack on the taskforce's star witness, she was facing possible questioning and mistrust from the officers around her; specifically Burrows and Lance.

Morgan needed to rectify the situation as soon as possible, hence her late night call to meet with Quentin Lance. Morgan was fairly sure of the approach she needed to take with him, but she had to be alert and use all of her skilled intuition to be able to adapt if the conversation with him went against her expectations. Morgan slipped a hand under her bedsheets to reach for the syringe full of sedative that she was going to use on Lance if the conversation went very badly; a syringe she was able to steal during her brief walk along the corridor earlier. A nurse had hurriedly steered her back to bed, amazed at her patient's determination to get on her feet so soon after surgery.

A light tap on her hospital room door preceded Captain Lance's arrival, giving Morgan enough time to remove her hand from under the sheets. Morgan smiled briefly as Lance entered the room.

"How are you doing?" said Lance as he approached Morgan's bed.

"Good, I think. I should be out of here tomorrow," said Morgan, shifting in her seated position and wincing slightly.

"Really?" said Lance, bemused that anyone would have improved so quickly from the injuries that Morgan sustained.

"Well the doctors want me to stay around, but I have work to do," said Morgan.

"I'm not one for listening to doctors, but I'd say they have a point in your case. You were shot up pretty bad," said Lance.

Morgan paused before she spoke, and looked up at Lance. His warm brown eyes appraising her, and the look of concern on his face, allowed Morgan to assume that she could take a gamble with her approach to him. She remembered back to their first meeting in the coffee shop, when it was obvious that he had been checking her out from behind in the queue – there was an attraction on his part; and this could be exploited to help her win him over. Morgan shifted again in the bed and winced to an extent that was far beyond any twinge of pain she was feeling. Lance stepped forward his hands reaching for her.

"Here let me help," he said as she sat up further and he positioned the pillows behind her better.

"Thank you," she breathed, looking warmly into his eyes.

Lance looked at her for a moment, his brow briefly knotting as if not sure of something, before he straightened himself to his full height and smothered a small cough to clear his throat. Lance looked behind him to the room's doorway as if he was checking that no-one had overseen their private moment. Morgan noted his discomfort and the look he gave behind him and knew she was on to the right track. How stupidly typical some men are she thought.

"Is there any more news from the Rosen investigation? Or on the identity of the fake nurse who tried to attack me?" said Morgan, straightening the sheets across her lap.

"Forensics are still sifting through the data they collected from the crash site, and Burrows is working on the other issue, but there's no evidence to suggest she was going to attack you," said Lance.

"Why else was she here then?" said Morgan smoothly.

"Well, I was going to ask you that," said Lance.

"I don't know. I'm just glad she was disturbed, or I might not be here talking to you right now," replied Morgan silkily, looking up at Lance, a thin smile playing across her lips. Lance felt heat rising from his neck and up to his lower face.

"You don't think…..no, it's too far-fetched," said Morgan, looking briefly at Lance and then off to the left, out of the window.

"What?" said Lance, his curiosity engaged.

"Maybe they're connected. Maybe whoever attacked the transport wanted no witnesses, and came here to silence me," said Morgan, her eyes glazing with emotion, "I'm sorry, the last couple of days have been tough."

Morgan held a hand, slightly shaking, up under her nose as if she was about to burst out crying. Lance's awkwardness with any kind of emotional display was well known amongst his family, friends and work colleagues. Morgan was gratified to see he was battling with this discomfort as his body language implied a need to try and comfort Morgan. Lance stepped closer to Morgan's bed and placed a hand over hers on the bedcovers. If the nurse hadn't of entered the room at that point to conduct her regular observations Morgan wondered whether Lance might have tried to hug her.

Sergeant Burrow's curiosity got the better of her and she walked up the corridor to the open doorway of Special Agent Morgan's room, just in time to see the nurse entering the room and Lance leaning over Morgan's bed holding her hand, the two looking into each other's eyes. Burrows paused a moment, confused, her face flushing and then walked back down to Peter Corvelli's room, her thoughts a cacophony of sound in her head.

"Look, I'll get an update from forensics and Burrows and come by when they have something," said Lance backing away from Morgan's bedside, completely unaware that Burrows had seen him leaning over Morgan's bed.

"Thank you for coming by, I know you must be busy," cooed Morgan who smiled and then winced slightly as she shifted in the bed.

"No problem. Just keep doing what the doctors say and you'll be back in no time," said Lance, who looked once more at Morgan, opened his mouth as if to say something else, then closed his mouth and then turned and walked out of her room.

"I think that one's sweet on you," said the nurse, who began busying herself with taking blood from Morgan.

Morgan slid a smile up the side of her face, arched an eyebrow, and looked at the open empty doorway that Lance had just passed through. This is going to be easier than I thought, mused Morgan.

"You look uncomfortable," said Laurel, stifling a smile, her eyes dancing with good humour as they gently swayed to the music.

"Monkey suits aren't my go to outfit of choice," muttered Ted.

"Shame," said Laurel, "you wear it very well."

Ted looked at Laurel, checking to see if she was being sarcastic, but the warmth of the look he received from her told him otherwise. Despite the room being full of people he had nothing in common with, despite the music not being to his taste, and despite the discomfort of his clothes, he hadn't felt this good in a long time. Ted's left arm, around Laurel's lower back, pulled her further towards him and met no resistance. Ted leaned towards Laurel's face and kissed her lightly on the lips. Laurel slipped her left hand out of Ted's and lightly rested it against the side of his cheek and returned his kiss.

On the other side of the ballroom the Mayor was still in conversation with Ray Palmer, and Hal Harkness, the businessman who had donated a sizeable fortune to get the Gala for Renewal project up and running. Since he had arrived in Starling a few weeks ago, the businessman's work in the Glades in trying to encourage small business ventures, in sponsoring community events and groups (including the one that Peter Corvelli volunteered at), was starting to see his name being mentioned in local press reports. The Mayor was as keen to keep Harkness onside as he had once been to keep Ray Palmer within his business portfolio of friends.

If the Mayor had even the slightest inkling of the true foundation of Harkness's wealth and power he wouldn't have been so keen to keep him so close. Hal Harkness was very careful to keep his other life securely hidden from view, away from the scrutiny of the SCPD and the prying eyes of investigative journalists. For now he allowed the local business community to court him and his money, he allowed the Mayor to glad-hand him and introduce him around the room as a firm friend of Starling, for now he was the man he needed to be. The time would come when he would shed his present covering and become something else.

Suddenly two senior SCPD officers in their uniforms walked over to the Mayor. There was a short conversation typified by heads being close together and the Mayor looking grave. Oliver, whose attention was still often diverted towards Thea and her mysterious friend, noticed the change in Palmer's demeanour as well as that of the Mayor. Barnes steered Thea away from the group forming around the Mayor, appearing to chat amiably with her as they walked in the direction of the bar.

John approached Oliver and Felicity, and the three colleagues watched with well-practiced attention as the hubbub around the Mayor grew, and orders started to flow in words and via the mobile phone clamped to the ear of the Mayor's aide. A few of the dancing couples swaying near the Mayor and his aides automatically started to move away further into the centre of the ballroom, as if their good humour and joie de vivre was offended by the presence of so many stern looking men clustering around the Mayor.

Lyla, though ever on duty and being watchful of her charge, looked over at John and then spoke into the concealed communication device attached to her dress under the guise of a brooch. Moments later, she was reaching a hand towards the elbow of the businessman under her care and talking quietly into his ear before steering him calmly towards the exit to the room. Lyla threw a glance at John as she left the ballroom that seemed to say, I'll explain later, don't worry.

Felicity had been scanning her mobile phone since the tension around the Mayor had escalated, her nimble fingers tapping across her screen as she flicked through data sources that connected her to her cobalt encrypted workstation in the Foundry.

"It's Iron Heights," she said in her clipped worried tones, "there's a riot, two prison officers killed, and prisoners have escaped. The DoC has requested back up from the SCPD."

John and Oliver shared a look of concern, before the latter turned to look in the direction of his sister Thea; still engaged in conversation with her mysterious suitor.

"Felicity and I will head back to the Foundry, I'll contact Roy on route," said Oliver in a firm but muted tone, his eyes blazing steel, "John I need you to stay here."

Diggle's face contorted into a question and he stepped towards Oliver as if to argue with him. Oliver held up a hand, palm out towards his friend.

"I need you to keep watch over Thea. I have a bad feeling about that guy," said Oliver, glancing over to where his sibling was standing with Tyler Barnes, "and judging by Barnes's interest in the guy talking to the Mayor, we need to know more about him too. Palmer might be your way in to their conversation."

Diggle looked over at Thea and then back at Oliver and sighed.

"Fine, but if this party ends I'll be joining yours," said Diggle a determined look on his face. Oliver nodded, and then slipped a hand under Felicity's elbow and steered her towards the ballroom's entrance doorway, her eyes still glued to her mobile phone and happy to be guided by Oliver.

As Roy stepped out of the elevator on to the ICU floor at Starling General Hospital he was met by Sergeant Kate Burrows, just emerging from Peter Corvelli's room. Burrows seemed lost in her own thoughts and Roy noticed she was making occasional fists of her hands as she stood at Corvelli's doorway, looking at everything and yet nothing in particular.

Burrows didn't seem to notice Harper was standing right by her, and reacted as if shocked by his presence when he spoke to her.

"Hey, you OK?" said Roy.

"What? Yeah I'm fine," said Burrows distractedly.

Quentin Lance walked up the corridor towards the pair of them and Roy noticed that Burrows breathed in a small sharp breath before the Captain arrived. Lance nodded at Harper, who replied with the same gesture before Roy stepped into Peter's room and walked over to his bedside. The pale body of the young man looked no different than when he'd last visited with him, but was it Roy's imagination or did the numbers displayed on the monitor by the bedside, to which Peter was wired up to, seem to have improved?

"Did you get anything from Morgan?" said Burrows, her tone oddly professional, her eyes hardly meeting Lance's.

"No," said Lance, slightly exasperated.

"Maybe you should try batting your eyelashes more," muttered Burrows.

"What?" said Lance.

Before he had a chance to say anything else to Burrows, Lance's mobile phone started ringing, and he reached in to his pocket for it, a distracted look on his face.

"Lance," he barked into the phone. A few seconds passed during which the expression on Lance's face turned from one of confusion to surprise to concern.

"I'm on my way," said Lance before jabbing a thumb at his phone to end the call. "There's a break out at Iron Heights, we gotta go."

Lance and Burrows headed quickly for the elevator. Roy, who had been within earshot of their conversation, reached into his pocket, took out his mobile phone and speed dialled Oliver's number.

"I take it you've heard. Get to the Foundry as soon as you can," said Oliver.

Laurel and Ted Grant had been initially distracted with each other when the hubbub around the Mayor had begun, but her keen eyes and his nose for trouble had soon detected that something was amiss. Laurel stopped one of the senior police officers present as he walked past her and Ted and discovered that trouble had broken out at Iron Heights, and that the Department of Corrections had called the SCPD for back-up; it was mentioned that Captain Lance had responded to the call.

"Sounds like things are getting out of control there," said the senior officer, concern in his voice, "we may all have a busy night ahead of us."

Ted Grant watched as Laurel's eyes scanned the room as if searching for someone. There was also something else in her expression that was making him feel uneasy.

"I have to head to my office," said Laurel, placing a hand on Grant's arm, "sorry."

"No problem. I'll walk you there, it's only a few blocks," said Grant.

"No that's OK. I have to go somewhere first," said Laurel, and evasive note to her words. Her scan of the room had noted that Oliver and Felicity had both left the gala, although John Diggle was still in the room. If Oliver had left it meant that the Arrow considered the events taking place at Iron Heights serious enough to warrant his presence. And if things were that serious, her father was heading in to certain danger.

Laurel started walking towards the front of the hotel, and had almost reached the grand glass entrance doors when Grant caught up with her. The doors automatically opened and a blast of cool night air washed over them as they stepped through and on to the steps leading down to the sidewalk.

"Laurel, what's going on with you?" said Grant.

"Nothing," said Laurel.

"Don't lie to me," said Ted Grant his tone stern.

Laurel stopped at the bottom of the steps and turned to face Grant. He looked into her face and suddenly he knew the answer to his own question.

"You're going to Iron Heights," said Grant.

"My father's there. He's not supposed to be out in the field anymore," said Laurel in a pleading tone, as if her statement explained everything, "I have to try and help."

"So what exactly is it that you think you're going to do when you get there? In the middle of a prison riot, with two men already dead?" said Grant.

"Whatever I can," said Laurel, hailing a passing taxi. As the cab drew up alongside of her, she opened the door and got in. As she was about to give the driver directions to her apartment, Grant had opened the other rear door of the cab and got in beside her.

"What are you doing?" said Laurel.

"Going with you," said Grant.

 **Chapter Six**

The woman had done her homework to perfection. Dressed as an SCPD officer and using fake ID and documentation she had easily gained entrance to Iron Heights prison. Within five minutes she was in the Control Room, had subdued two prison officers with tranquiliser darts, and disabled the control panel monitoring various parts of the building. Reaching into her backpack, which she had concealed under her oversized police jacket, she threw a timed explosive charge into the control room as she ran out of it.

With the sound of that explosion detonating behind her, she then ran to place a small explosive device on the metal gate leading into the main area of the prison, shielding her eyes as the device exploded. A prison guard made a move towards her and was swiftly dealt a combination of punches and kicks that sent him crashing unconscious to the ground. The woman retrieved the keys hanging from his belt, and chucked them through the bars of the cell of the first prisoner she ran past.

Throwing a couple of smoke canisters and setting off fire alarm panels as she continued on her progress through the prison, she had little need to attack any other prison guards she encountered, as there was too much confusion for anyone to notice her jogging through the prison. She slipped her handgun in the holster attached to the back of her trousers and started to run towards her target. Within a five minutes she was outside the cell housing Rivers, and placing another small explosive device over the tough metal lock. Rivers, though surprised by the sudden turn of events, saw the woman shielding her eyes, and immediately did the same just as the device exploded and his cell door flung itself open.

"C'mon. Stay close," said the woman as she turned and started running back down the cell corridor, Rivers hard on her heels.

Confusion reigned as Rivers and the woman ran down one smoke filled, or fire sprinkler drenched, corridor after another, back towards the central area of the prison, dodging past pumped up and angry inmates, and prison guards attempting to subdue them. Small fires had spread from the explosions that she had detonated, which had been added to by prisoners throwing their bedding and clothing on to the conflagration. Thick choking smoke started to drift throughout the building. Multiple alarms started to sound, and frantic phone calls were made to the guards in the Control Room, who could not pick up their phones as they were still unconscious. Further calls were made to the Prison Governor and then the local fire service when the fires burning in several places inside the prison triggered the entire prison network overhead sprinkler system to switch on.

Without central monitoring, communication, and orders, the prison guards were at a loss to know how they would regain control, so they drew back, allowing the freed prisoners to let more of their brother inmates out of their cells, adding to the chaos as petty rivalries and grudges surfaced and led to individuals, and groups of prisoners, to attack each other.

The woman dived down a long corridor with a large metal doorway at the end. There were two prison guards stationed there, their nightsticks held firmly in their hands. As the woman ran up to them they noticed her uniform, and were therefore expecting a report about the events taking place on the other side of the prison, so they were surprised to see her slip her handgun out of its back holster. They had no time to respond as she fired two shots, one at each man, sending them crashing to the floor in agony.

The woman simply stepped over to the two men, walked over to the electronic panel housing the door locking mechanism and reaching into her backpack withdrew the last of her explosive charges, fixing it firmly to the panel. She stepped away from the door, grabbing hold of Rivers and slamming him against the adjacent wall, shielded her eyes and waited for the explosion. The lock disintegrated in a shower of electrical sparks and burnt wiring. Rivers looked back down the corridor to see some prisoners in their orange jumpsuits approaching.

The woman stepped up to the metal door and pulled at the large metal bar running along its width. The door started to slide along the metal rut carved in the concrete floor below it. Rivers joined her and using both their strength they created enough of a gap to allow them to pass through. The woman started running towards the tree line a few hundred yards away. Rivers followed her, turning once to see other prisoners escaping through the doorway and running as fast as they could in all directions away from Iron Heights.

When they had reached the tree line, Rivers stopped to look back at the prison. He could hear multiple alarms sounding, see plumes of smoke emanating from at least three different sites, and he could hear the sound of violence within. The call had obviously been given for the prison guards to be armed, the last resort in any prison, as he heard a few gunshots starting to ring out. Rivers blew out a long low whistle.

"You certainly know how to throw a good party!" he said.

"C'mon this way," said the woman, her tone stern and brusque.

Rivers quickly followed the woman as she headed deeper into the forest, towards the black van she had parked earlier. By the time the woman and Rivers reached the van, the news of the riot at Iron Heights had reached the Mayor. The woman looked at her watch as she slipped into the driver's seat of the van. She smiled. As always she was on time.

The Arrow and Arsenal arrived at Iron Heights by motorcycle, ahead of Lance but after the first couple of SCPD patrol cars had been sent. Within seconds of arriving they were engaged in backing up police officers who had already got into trouble fighting hardened criminals with experience of street fighting. Control of the central portion of Iron Heights had been conceded to the prisoners, but there was still hope of containing them there, and preventing any other prisoners escaping through the back door.

Back at the Arrow cave, Felicity was doing her best to monitor a cacophony of communications and video data pouring across the three monitors on her workstation. Within five minutes she had managed to hack into the prison CCTV system, feeding useful information to Oliver and Roy through their Bluetooth devices, and Captain Lance by mobile phone.

More SCPD squad cars arrived, along with three SWAT teams, and soon a solid cordon had been formed around Iron Heights, preventing any more prisoners from fleeing. Inch by inch, the forces of law and order, plus the riot weary Department of Corrections officers, managed to push the prisoners back towards the central portion of the prison, re-housing inmates back in to cells – if not their original one, then at least one that would contain them in the interim.

Oliver and Roy hung back where possible to allow the SCPD to take the lead, and to prevent too many people from being alerted to their presence. They ran towards the rear of the prison and dived into the forested area adjacent to it, and began tracking fleeing prisoners. Using arrows fitted with tension cords they managed to find and pinion several fleeing inmates against trees, which Felicity then alerted Lance to so that the SCPD could collect them and escort them back to prison.

The taxi bearing Laurel Lance and Ted Grant dropped Ted off at his apartment, before continuing on to Laurel's place. Ted rapidly changed into more comfortable clothing, grabbed his black leather jacket and a balaclava, and raced for his car outside. By the time he drew up at the rear of Laurel's apartment she was already in her black leather Canary outfit, her mask and blonde wig easily concealing her identity beneath. She ran down the fire escape at the back of her building and slipped in through the open passenger door of Ted's car, slamming it shut as Ted slammed his foot down on the accelerator.

They arrived at the rear side of Iron Heights before the police cordon had been locked down, slipping off road and across country to try and hide their presence; Ted switched off the headlights and drove blind for the last few hundred yards. Laurel was out of the car the moment Ted braked, gripping her short metal fighting stick firmly in her hand as she ran towards the sound of fighting and gunfire. Ted cursed under his breath, slipped on the balaclava and raced after Laurel.

Captain Lance and Sergeant Burrows threw themselves into the thick of things a soon as they arrived at Iron Heights; quickly assessing the situation as how best to proceed. At one point Lance gripped hold of his chest, which was witnessed by Burrows, who stepped over to him as he was swallowing his heart mediation.

"Sir…," started Burrows.

"Sergeant, don't even think it," said Lance, instinctively knowing what Burrows was going to say.

Lance became in effect command and control, though the jurisdictional particulars of the situation were up for debate, everyone seemed to be looking to the man who had helped marshal forces to defend Starling City during its worst recent crises. Burrows hurried around communicating with SWAT teams, SCPD officers and the DoC, using the helpful information that Lance was getting from Felicity Smoak.

Quentin was impressed with Burrows handling of the situation, firm when she needed to be but willing to take on board useful suggestions from her colleagues. Reports started to reach Lance of the Arrow, Arsenal, and a woman in black leather assisting with the recapture of fleeing inmates. Lance was half glad and half worried about the last sighting, as he didn't like Sara throwing herself into dangerous situations, but he couldn't help feeling that her particular skill set was exactly what was called for right now. He felt his heart surge with pride and hoped he might be able to speak to her when the situation was under control.

As the cordon around the prison was set, the SCPD, SWAT and DoC teams began to move into the building, capturing prisoners and regaining control of the building as they moved in towards the central core of the prison. Lance hung back at first, to make sure command and control communication was consistent, but he was itching to get inside the building, so he drew his side arm and along with a small team of SCPD officers, he entered through a side door. As Lance proceeded further into the building it was obvious that the officers who had preceded him, like Burrows, had cleared the way as Lance initially met no resistance.

As Lance and his fellow officers approached the central core of the building, it was obvious that the fight was still ongoing. The air hung with smoke and fine showers of water poured from the sprinkler system in the ceiling. Lance could hear gunfire and men shouting. As Lance got to the end of a corridor he turned left into a larger rectangular area bordered by opened cells with a corridor leading off on either side about halfway along, with another landing of cells above ground level. Up ahead of his position Lance could see Burrows on the far side of the room voicing a loud warning to a prisoner to put down the metal pipe he was brandishing as a weapon, her outstretched arms pointing her service revolver at the man.

Suddenly another prisoner appeared from the corridor on Burrows' left and handed a punch to her head that sent her reeling, her gun spilling out of her hand. Her attacker then pulled out a knife from his pocket and as Burrows scrambled to her feet she launched herself at him, and they wheeled around, Burrows trading punches in return for jabs and swipes with the blade by her opponent. Lance started to run towards Burrows, but the prisoner with the metal pipe raced forward holding the pipe above his head as he bore down on Lance. Lance stood his ground, holding his gun before him and shouted a warning; which was not heeded as the prisoner charged at Lance.

Suddenly a woman with blonde hair dressed head to toe in black leather appeared out of nowhere and brought a metal stick down across the back of the inmate running towards Captain Lance. The guy fell forward and then instantly recouped and swung the metal pipe in his hands round at the woman, who parried and then through a quick succession of strikes, knocked the inmate unconscious. The woman in black leather briefly looked across at Lance, and then turned and fled.

"Sara," Lance called out as she ran away.

At the same time that the Canary was fighting off the prisoner attacking Lance. Burrows continued to struggle to fend off her opponent, and took a couple of hard punches that disorientated her. Her opponent took that opportunity to swipe the blade that he was holding across her torso and cut a deep gash across her left shoulder. Burrows yelled out and bent forward grabbing her arm. She then turned and threw herself across the floor in the direction of her gun, and whipping around, fired a shot towards her attacker who had already turned and ran. Burrows scrambled to her feet.

Suddenly out of nowhere Burrows took a pistol shot to the chest, her Kevlar vest took the brunt of the impact as she fell backwards to the floor, disorientated and gasping for breath. Lance looked up to the landing above them where the shot had come from and saw that the Canary was already there attacking the shooter and disarming him. The gun spilled down to the floor below, near the prone Burrows. As Lance reached Burrows, he bent down at her side and looked up, as the Canary was landing the decisive punch to the shooter on the first landing before she ran the length of the walkway and disappeared at its end.

Lance slipped his right hand under Burrows head and cradled it up off of the cold concrete floor.

"Kate, you're bleeding," said Lance, trying to move her protective vest with his free hand, searching for an entry wound that would account for the blood.

"It's OK, it's just a cut, I'm OK," she panted, her hand resting around Lance's wrist as she looked into his eyes, willing him to say her name again.

Ted Grant was having a hard time trying to keep up with Laurel Lance in order to watch her back, whilst defending himself from random punches and kicks aimed at him by freed inmates. Ted's balaclava was also starting to attract attention from DoC and SCPD officers, a few of which tried to chase him down whilst he was in the process of chasing after Laurel. Ted managed to finally catch up with the Canary after she had saved her father and his Sergeant from being shot by a prisoner on a first floor landing. As Laurel disappeared down a side corridor, Ted finally managed to get a hand on her, and he grabbed her elbow.

"Will you slow down, you're running in blind!" he panted as she turned to face him, her eyes ablaze with adrenaline, "you're gonna get yourself killed at this rate!"

Laurel took a breath, looked at Ted, and briefly nodded her head.

"It looks like the police are pushing them back," said Laurel, looking up and down the corridor they were standing in, as if deciding which way to go, "let's head out."

Laurel and Ted ran back towards the rear entrance to Iron Heights, encountering a couple of surprised SCPD officers who didn't have time to react before the two masked strangers in black shot past them. The two officers then debated between them what they could safely report in via their radios without them having to appear before their Sergeant to face disciplinary charges for exaggeration and fabrication.

The cool air hit Laurel and Ted as they stepped away from the prison building and towards the edge of the tree line. Above, the sky was clear and the stars were putting on a dazzling display. On the ground the headlights of a multitude of police and DoC vehicles parked around the periphery of the Iron Heights complex was keeping the darkness at bay. Laurel and Ted stood in the shadow of the large trees and watched for a couple of minutes as police officers escorted captured inmates back into the prison building, with injured inmates and law enforcement officers escorted in the opposite direction to waiting ambulances. Laurel saw her father walking by the side of a stretcher bearing Sergeant Burrows as it was wheeled to the back of an emergency vehicle, its doors wide open. Laurel noticed that her father gripped Burrows hand briefly as the stretcher was being loaded on the ambulance.

"Let's go," said Laurel quietly, turning to run in the direction of Ted's car, parked several hundred yards away on a dirt track. Ted turned and ran after Laurel, both of them unaware that a masked man in dark red leather had seen them before they disappeared into the deep shadows cast by the forest.

On the drive back to central Starling, Ted glanced occasionally at Laurel in the passenger seat beside him. He now knew the extent of the commitment and determination burning inside this woman; the fire in her to do good, to honour her sister Sara, to protect her father, and to help her city. Ted knew it would only get harder to keep her away from these night time excursions; and the more training she received the more she would want to put it into practice in real situations.

Ted would continue to urge caution, he didn't have any other option but to try and make her see the worst case scenario. He had been there himself, a lone vigilante in Starling, even before the arrival of the Arrow. He knew intimately the pain and the anguish his decisions caused, the physical pain he constantly endured, and the lonely life that he made for himself back then; friendless and unloved, not able to reach out to anyone for fear they would get hurt by association with him. Ted didn't want that for Laurel, but she was consumed with her mission to be the Canary. If he wanted to be with her, he would have to accept that, and if he accepted that then he would have to do everything he could to train her to keep her safe.

Over an hour later, Oliver and Roy walked back into the Arrow cave. Felicity and John were standing with their backs to the bank of monitors on Felicity's workstation as the two men approached, each going to their respective glass case to deposit their bows.

"Two wardens dead, scores injured, part of the building burnt out," said Oliver, hands on his hips, a pained expression on his face "what the hell happened?"

Oliver slammed his bow back into its rest in the glass cabinet with such force that Felicity thought the glass would shatter.

"Who the hell happened more like," said John turning to point at the central monitor on Felicity's desk. Oliver threw him a quizzical look and walked over to the monitors. On screen was a blurred still image of a woman police officer, wearing a patrol cap.

"She walks in at 9.07pm, and all hell breaks loose at 9.12pm. I'm trying to salvage archive images from that time period but there was massive damage done to the central control room at Iron Heights, so I may not be able to access it remotely," said Felicity pointing towards the image of the woman on screen, "I'm running the image through facial recognition but it's not a clear shot."

Oliver turned and walked over to the black leather chair by the workstation opposite to Felicity's and sat down heavily in it, sighing. He leaned forward and clasped his gloved hands together.

"Are we missing something here?" said Oliver.

"What do you mean?" said Roy.

"Michael Rosen appears from nowhere and the federal team transporting him is attacked. Peter Corvelli strays in to the wrong part of town and ends up in hospital, and a riot breaks out in Iron Heights; all in the past week. Plus this new guy, Tyler Barnes, turns up. Is there a link?" said Oliver, sitting back and holding his hands out palm upwards.

"If there is I can't imagine what it is," said John, folding his arms across his impressive chest, his brow furrowing.

"Nor can I," said Oliver leaning back and looking at the ceiling for a moment before he sighed out, "and was it just me or did everyone see Laurel at Iron Heights."

Roy, Felicity and John exchanged furtive looks with each other, silently knowing the answer. Oliver didn't have to wait for their responses to know the answer either. Felicity had spotted Laurel, dressed as the Canary, on CCTV footage she had hacked into outside of iron Heights, and had drawn John's attention to her presence there. The two friends had decided not to mention it to Oliver unless he brought the subject up due to the sensitivities involved. Now that the cat was out of the bag, there was no point in holding back any points of view they all had about Laurel taking on Sara's mantel.

"She could have got herself killed," said Roy, "even with that guy backing her up."

"That has to be Ted Grant," muttered John.

"Well if we all saw her there's a good chance Captain Lance did too," said Felicity softly.

"Except he thinks he would have seen Sara," said Oliver in a small sad voice, which affected Felicity. Though Sara Lance was dead, she had been such a powerful presence in all their lives, particularly Oliver's, that it was almost as if her spirit had remained in the Arrow cave.

Suddenly Oliver stood up, clapping his hands together, which made Felicity jump.

"For now, we wait to see if Felicity can identify our mystery woman. Right now, everyone needs to go home," said Oliver in a manner both brusque and affirmative that brooked no argument.

Roy walked through to the back of the Arrow cave to change out of his Arsenal suit, at which point John and Felicity shared a look , and then the former stepped forward towards Oliver as he was unzipping his leather Arrow jacket and heading off to change.

"Oliver," whispered John, "Felicity may have found something out about our mysterious Tyler Barnes."

"Well Felicity hasn't found out that much about Tyler Barnes actually. Which is really significant," said Felicity, causing Oliver to furrow his brow in confusion.

"What?" muttered Oliver, confused.

"We don't think he exists," said John. Felicity walked over to her workstation and the two men followed her. Felicity sat in her chair and started tapping her fingers across her keyboard. An image of Tyler Barnes appeared on screen to the left, followed by several overlapping text boxes with pages from newspaper reports, internet search engines, and other data sources that Felicity had hacked into.

"No Social Security number, no checking account, no registration with any advertising organisation in the US or Canada, no car rental agreements, no loan applications, no store or credit cards..," said Felicity in clipped tones as if she was reading off a shopping list.

"I get the picture," said Oliver holding up a hand to stem the flow of Felicity's words, "he doesn't exist."

"Roy may be jealous, but he's right, this guy is not good news for Thea," said John.

"Felicity..," said Oliver, a question forming on his tongue.

"Oh don't worry I'm not giving up on this one," said Felicity archly, "I hate mysteries."

"I'll stay close to Thea for a while," said Oliver walking towards the rear of the Arrow cave to change out of his Arrow suit, "let's see if our mystery man can cope with an uneven playing field."

Felicity tapped a few more keys, and then seeing the small clock ticking away in the bottom right hand corner of her monitor, hissed back an expletive and stood up, grabbing her coat and handbag from the end of the workstation where she had dumped it a few hours before.

"I've got a board meeting first thing, I gotta go," she said, rapidly walking towards the rear of the Arrow cave, her blonde ponytail bobbing from side to side.

As Felicity passed Oliver's "bedroom", the corner area containing his mattress, a light and a few boxes of his possessions, she allowed her eyes to briefly linger on the rumpled bedding and a memory flashed hot across her memory of the two of them. When would they have the chance to be together again? Felicity breathed in a short sharp breath and made to head towards the secret rear exit when she caught Oliver to her right, standing in the doorway to the shower room.

Oliver had obviously seen Felicity pause to look at the bed and knew what she must have been thinking. His warm eyes held Felicity's gaze and he gave her a small tight lipped smile, which seemed to say, "I know, I feel the same." Felicity's kind eyes smiled at Oliver, she hoisted her handbag over her shoulder and she headed for the exit.

The woman drove the van through the streets of Starling to the new secret location that she had scouted earlier in the day. Once the van was parked down a quiet side street, Rivers and the woman exited the vehicle and he followed her along the street until they came to some wire fencing surrounding the shell of an apartment block in the process of being built. The woman walked over to the gated part of the fence and picked the lock of the heavy metal padlock securing the metal gate, pulling it closed and sliding the bar back into place once she and Rivers were on the other side of the fence.

Rivers, as he had done since they had emerged from Iron Heights, continued to swivel his head in all directions looking out for any sign that he was being followed. The woman had found this initially amusing, but after nearly an hour in his company, it was becoming an annoying habit.

The woman walked towards the concrete and steel shell of the building, and skirted around the edge towards its rear, where there was more development of the site. There were two rooms, completely bare, but protected from the elements by walls and a roof, that had been completed, and the woman headed into the first of these by shoulder charging the chipboard door placed over the entranceway. The temporary door easily swung on its metal brackets and allowed them entry into the cold concrete rectangular space beyond.

On a small wooden trestle table in the centre of the room was a small pile of clothing, and two knapsacks. The woman pointed towards the table.

"Change your clothes. I'll go and get some food. Do not move from this room," she said, staring at Rivers, her tone as cold as ice.

When the woman returned with Chinese take out for them both, Rivers had done as bidden and changed out of his prison jumpsuit into the dark military fatigues she had provided for him. Rivers had stripped a sub-automatic machine gun, which had been in a holdall next to the pile of clothing, and was in the process of putting it back together when the woman walked back into the concrete room inside the partially developed construction site.

The woman stood and watched him silently as he finished piecing the gun back into serviceable order, and then snatched the weapon from his hands, and thrust the bag of take-out food at him.

"Eat," she said brusquely.

"So what's the job?" said Rivers as he started opening cartons of food and placing them on the trestle table in the centre of the empty room, "I assume there is one, otherwise why break me out?"

"Simple heist, but it'll take a team of three. Your skills and experience made you an obvious choice. The pay-out is substantial, risk minimal," said the woman grabbing for a carton of food.

"When?" said Rivers

"Tomorrow night," said the woman. Rivers raised an eyebrow at the timescale but shrugged.

"There's something I need to deal with," said Rivers munching on noodles.

The woman turned to Rivers, noodles clasped between chopsticks, the food hovering at her lips. If her accomplice had been present he would have said his experience with her limited range of expressions would signify that she was surprised at Rivers request; but Rivers only saw a blank stare on her face.

"Felicity Smoak," said Rivers through semi-gritted teeth, menace dripping from his tone.

The woman thrust the uneaten noodles back into the food carton and dropped it on to the trestle table. Then she stepped close to Rivers and looked into his eyes. When she spoke her tone was neutral, but her eyes blazed with emotion as she slowly enunciated every word at Rivers.

"You will eat, you will listen while I run through tomorrow's mission, and then you will sleep. Tomorrow morning we will prepare for the mission and then drive to the location for the heist," the woman took one further step towards Rivers, "If you successfully complete your side of the bargain, _then_ you can think about exacting your petty revenge fantasies on Miss Smoak. Is that understood?"

Rivers chewed on his food, held the woman's gaze, and then nodded curtly.

"Do everything I ask of you and I'll even make you a gift of her," said the woman, reaching for her food carton again.

Rivers chewed his food slowly. He had no doubt the woman would be as good a her word, but he swore to himself that no matter what the consequences he would make sure that he took every opportunity to put himself in the way of Miss Smoak again; the sooner the better.

At the same time that Sergeant Burrows was receiving the last stitch in her shoulder at Starling General Hospital, the woman, her accomplice, and Rivers were settling into sleeping bags on the cold concrete floor of a house construction several blocks away. Once "Tyler Barnes" had escorted Thea Queen back to her apartment, declining a thinly disguised attempt at an invitation for a night cap inside, the woman's accomplice had raced straight to the secret hideout and had changed out of his expensive suit into similar dark military clothing to Rivers.

Captain Lance walked through the triage area of the ER in Starling General, stopping the first nurse he met and enquiring as to his Sergeant's location. With Iron Heights back under full control of the Department of Corrections, Lance had been able to stand down the police SWAT teams and at least half of the SCPD officers that had answered the open call for assistance to quell the riot at the prison.

With all prisoners accounted for, a police helicopter making regular flights over the prison, and a cordon of the remaining police officers on the scene around the prison, Lance assessed the situation didn't warrant his presence anymore. That, and the fact that Lance's immediate superior, who hadn't even visited the scene, phoned, got a sit rep, and then ordered him to go home and get some rest; threatening to call Lance's daughter Laurel if he didn't obey.

Lance steered his car away from the prison, and was heading in the direction of his first floor flat just north of the Glades when he suddenly turned the vehicle to the right and headed in the direction of Starling General Hospital. As he drove he punched the speed dial on his mobile phone, mounted on the car dashboard and watched as "Dialling Sara" flashed across the screen. The phone rang for three rings and then switched to voicemail, and for a pleasant few moments Quentin Lance listened to the sweet girlish voice of his youngest daughter echoing around the car asking him to leave a message.

"Hey Sara it's your Dad. Look I saw you earlier at Iron Heights, so I know you're in town. I know you're busy, but if you get a chance call me OK? Maybe we can get a coffee or something to eat at that Chinese place you like. Whatever, I'm easy. But call me OK, it would be good to hear your voice, OK bye," said Lance, as he pulled into the car park at Starling General.

As Lance flipped back the curtain on the cubicle where the nurse had directed him to, Lance caught sight of Sergeant Burrows, minus her shirt, receiving the final stitch in her upper arm from the attending physician. Burrows face was turned away from the sight of the stitching, so she didn't notice Lance at first, but she turned her head as the doctor spoke.

"Can I help you?"

Lance muttered a noise through half open lips as he stood, his hand still holding the cubicle curtain, looking at Burrows, sitting on the gurney, naked from the waist up except for her bra. Lance's eyes met Burrows' and he immediate dipped his head, let go of the curtain and stood outside the cubicle as the doctor finished with his Sergeant. Lance felt his neck getting warm and rubbed a hand across his face, feeling the stubble forming, feeling embarrassed.

A minute or two later the curtain was pulled back from the inside to reveal Burrows buttoning up her shirt, blood from the wound drying to a dull dark orange across the material on one side.

"She's all yours," said the doctor as he left the cubicle, "I wouldn't try anything to adventurous though, she's still a bit sore."

Burrows barely concealed a quick snort of laughter as the doctor winked at her and then walked off in the direction of the central ER desk.

"What was that about?" said Lance, raising his eyebrows.

"Private joke, don't mind him," said Lance slipping off of the gurney and grabbing her jacket from the chair next to it, "everything OK?"

"Yeah, Iron Heights is locked back down. I was heading home but I thought I'd check in on you," said Lance.

"Thanks, I'm OK," said Burrows , slipping an arm into her jacket and then wincing markedly as she tried to slip her wounded arm into the vacant sleeve.

"Here, let me," said Lance, as he stepped around the back of Burrows, slipped her jacket back down her arm, and then gently slid the material under both hands, up her arms, and finally over her shoulders. Burrows winced once more as the material slipped over her injured shoulder, but felt a warm sensation coursing through her as Lance stepped back in front of her and pulled gently at the front of the jacket making sure it was snuggly in place. Burrows looked up into Lance's eyes, his face only inches away. Lance looked down slightly at Burrows, caught between a feeling and an action.

The moment was broken by the reappearance of the doctor who flung back the cubicle curtain and stepped forward, his hand outstretched and holding a small vial of pills. Lance and Burrows immediately stepped back from each other.

"Sorry to interrupt Brief Encounter, but I thought you might need these for the pain. Two every four hours, no more," said the doctor, slipping the pill bottle into Burrows hand before winking at her and then turning to walk out of the cubicle.

"I should get going," said Lance, "just wanted to check you're OK."

"You said," said Burrows in a soft voice, a small smile curling up the side of her mouth.

"Yeah," said Lance, stepping back towards, "OK. Go home. I'll see you at work tomorrow."

Lance turned and walked straight into the cubicle curtain, and then made a hash of pulling at it the wrong way before he wrenched it open and exited, leaving Burrows feeling warm in the face and just a little bit giggly; which she obviously attributed to the strong pain medication she'd been given before the doctor started stitching her arm.

As the rain lashed down on Starling City through the darkness of the early morning, the woman, her accomplice and Rivers slept soundly in their cold, bare concrete secret location.

Across town Burrows took the first of her pain medication, sipped at some hot tea and replayed her "moment" in the ER room with Captain Quentin Lance a few times in her head until she drifted off into a very deep sleep.

John Diggle felt a light kiss on his cheek from Lyla as she slipped under the duvet and spooned herself against him. He reached behind him and pulled her arm across his body. In her crib in her room across the hall from her parent's room, Sara Diggle breathed out a happy sigh and kicked her feet in her sleep.

Despite the stresses and exertions of the night, for the first time in ages Quentin Lance didn't feel the need to take any heart medication before he slipped into bed. He lay back under the cool sheets, his hands behind his head on the pillow, looking up at the ceiling and letting his thoughts drift. He was glad Burrows was OK; more than glad.

Special Agent Kate Morgan arched her back in her hospital bed. She turned her head to the right staring at the wall, peering at it as if she could see through the concrete to the room at the end of her corridor where the comatose form of Peter Corvelli lay wired up to machines monitoring his every ragged breath. Suddenly she sat up, wincing slightly with the effort as her leg muscles pulled over the tender surgical site caused by the bullet wound she'd suffered. She puffed out a short sigh and reached to pick up her mobile phone lying on the small cabinet by her bed. Her mind made up, she punched in the number she'd memorised and had never dialled.

Laurel Lance padded back from the kitchen, sipping at a bottle of water, and then paused at the doorway to her bedroom. Ted Grant lay sleeping, one arm thrown above his head and under the pillow, the bedsheets wrapped around his lower half, his bare chest rising and falling in slumber. Laurel crept over to the bed, deposited the water bottle on her night stand, and gently slipped under the covers allowing herself to be pulled into Ted's arms as he became conscious of her presence beside him again.

In her flat on the other side of the city, Felicity Smoak turned in her sleep and stretched out a hand across the bed as if reaching out for someone.

In the bowels of the Foundry, Oliver slowly paced the Arrow cave, having given up on sleep, his brain churning with a variety of thoughts, his highly attuned senses alerting him to some pending danger that he could not articulate. Oliver sat down in Felicity's chair and ran a hand gently over her keyboard, the tips of his fingers gently touching the keys that she typed every day. The monitor in front of Oliver came to life and the last image displayed appeared again, the image of the woman caught on CCTV at Iron Heights prison. Oliver leaned forward and stared at the image.

"Who are you?" he muttered slowly.

 **Chapter Seven**

During their regular training session in the Arrow cave the following morning, John updated Oliver and Roy about what he'd found out about the businessman, Hal Harkness, the man that Thea's new "friend" was taking such an interest in at the Gala.

In between sustained and elegantly co-ordinated dives, punches, kicks and spins, John breathlessly spoke of Hal Harkness and his sudden appearance like a white knight into the Glades a couple of months ago. In a whirlwind of self-publicity and rampant spending he had earned himself a high approval rating in the court of public opinion, with both the local press and the inhabitants of Starling City welcoming his endeavours to clean up the streets and bring jobs to the Glades.

"So he's a good guy?" said Roy crouching down to avoid the sweep of Oliver's fighting stick connecting with his head.

"I think John's setting us up for a _but_ ," said Oliver, jumping backwards and deflecting John's stick jabbing towards his torso.

"But," said John, panting as he stood, his feet apart, catching his breath, a thin sheen of sweat coating his chest and arms, "there are a couple of things raising alarm bells with me."

Oliver tipped his head towards Roy with an expression that seemed to say " _See?"_ before walkingover to the nearby steel workbench and picking up a bottle of water.

"Lyla says he's on an ARGUS watch list. They had low level surveillance on his business activities due to a couple of dubious connections he made, but recently ARGUS has received two tip offs about criminal activity involving Mr Harkness, which turned out to be correct. So he's been elevated to the active non-priority watch list," said John, moving his head from side to side to stretch his neck muscles.

"And the other thing?" said Roy, wiping his hand across his forehead to remove some sweat dripping into his eyes.

"Ray Palmer doesn't like him," said John, with mock gravitas, "and I thought that guy liked everyone."

Oliver smiled and was about to reply to John when his mobile started ringing, and he walked over to Felicity's workstation to answer the call. As Oliver looked at the display he saw the image of Quentin Lance.

"Lance," said Oliver as he connected the call; a signal to Roy and John to keep silent. With the addition of the voice camouflage software that Felicity had installed on Oliver's mobile, it would be impossible for Lance to know that he was talking to Oliver Queen; Lance would hear the gravel bass tones of the Arrow.

"How can I help you Detective?" said Oliver.

"It may be more a case of me helping you, well Miss Smoak anyway," said Lance as he walked towards his favourite coffee shop, Java's.

Having just left a meeting at the DAs office about the events at Iron Heights the day before, Lance had only two things on his mind, phoning the Arrow and getting a large coffee.

"Why does she need help?" said Oliver, his brows knitting in slight concern.

"Well after Iron Heights was locked down, thanks for the assistance by the way, the DoC reported to the Mayor that all prisoners were accounted for. This morning it turns out that their head count was one short," said Lance as he crossed the street to stand outside Java's. The manager caught sight of him through the window and raised a hand in greeting, Lance nodded and repeated the gesture back, then turned his back on the coffee shop and concentrated on his phone call, dropping his voice slightly in case anyone overheard a serving and senior police officer giving privileged information away in public.

"Rivers is still missing. I figured since the guy who tried to attack Miss Smoak a couple of times is out on the streets, he might make a bee line for her again. Maybe you could have a word with her?" said Lance.

"Maybe I could. Thank you Detective," said Oliver, trying to keep his voice as calm as possible, though his thoughts and his emotions were churning with concern for Felicity.

"Oh hey, another thing," said Lance, "I know Sara's in town. I saw her at Iron Heights last night. I tried calling her but there was no answer. She's probably busy, but if you happen to see her, tell her to call me," said Lance, as he held the door open and allowed a customer to exit the coffee shop.

"I will," said Oliver before he ended the call, and placed his mobile phone back on Felicity's workbench. Oliver stood, silent and brooding, and seemed to stare off into the middle distance.

John walked over to where Oliver was standing, followed by Roy, the two men sharing a look of concern.

"By the look on your face, I'd say Lance just dropped a bombshell," said Roy.

"Our old friend Rivers escaped from Iron Heights, and is still missing," said Oliver, "and Lance definitely saw the Canary there last night, and wants me to get Sara to call him."

"Correction, two bombshells," said John, sighing.

The three men were all too aware of the painful significance of Lance still believing that his youngest daughter was still alive, when they all knew she had been killed a few months ago by an unknown assailant. An assailant they were no closer to finding as the trail had gone cold; a fact that was still eating away at all of Team Arrow.

"I need a pointed conversation with Laurel," said Oliver through gritted teeth, his eyes blazing. As he started walking towards the rear of the Arrow cave, John held out a strong hand and arrested his friend's progress. Oliver snapped his head around to look at John.

"Oliver, Laurel can wait, you need to talk to Felicity and warn her about Rivers," said John calmly, looking into Oliver's eyes.

Oliver sighed and nodded his head, and felt slightly ashamed. He knew that Diggle was right, he'd been so angry at Laurel throwing herself into her sister's dead shoes that he'd allowed that strong emotion, an emotion that had kept him alive for many years, to cloud the path to his true objective.

"You're right. I'll go and talk to her," said Oliver.

The last time that Oliver had surprised Felicity by turning up at her office, it had resulted in them drinking champagne on a roof top overlooking Starling City as the sun set, and then spending the night together in the basement of the Foundry. Felicity was therefore not unnaturally, and quite notably, flushed as Oliver walked through her open office doorway to surprise her at work again.

Felicity assured her assistant Jerry that everything was OK, as Oliver walked into Felicity's office unannounced and without an appointment, sending the eager young man off for a coffee break. Felicity turned to Oliver and smiled gently, but then seeing the serious expression on his face, her pleasure at seeing him gave way to concern about the reason for his visit to her.

Oliver explained that Rivers was out of Iron Heights. Whether by design or accident, he was the only prisoner not accounted for, which made the events of the night before look more like the former rather than the latter.

"Why would someone want to break him out?" said Felicity, waking back towards her desk.

"That's my second concern," said Oliver.

"And your first?" said Felicity.

"Making sure you are safe," said Oliver with calm determination, "You need to be cautious, and we need to keep an eye on you until Rivers is safely back behind bars."

Felicity looked up from the paperwork on her desk and met Oliver's eyes with her own. Her mouth curled up into a small closed lipped smile on one side.

"Are you my bodyguard now?"

"I'll be staying close," affirmed Oliver slowly walking around her desk to stand close to Felicity.

"Well I won't object to that," cooed Felicity as he approached. She tipped her head up to look him in full in the face, "But I don't want to be treated like Rapunzel by any of you."

Ray Palmer then bounded into Felicity's office and suddenly realised that Felicity wasn't on her own, and that he seemed to have interrupted a "moment" with her guest. Ray coughed politely and Felicity and Oliver stepped a decent pace away from each other. Felicity could feel heat crawling up her chest towards her face.

"Mr Queen," said Ray, throwing a quick curious glance at Felicity before turning to look at Oliver.

"Dr Palmer," said Oliver, walking towards the CEO of Palmer Technologies with his hand outstretched. Both men shook hands briefly and very firmly.

"I hope you're not trying to get any insider trading information out of my Vice President," said Ray, ending with a fake laugh.

"No. I came to relay a message from Captain Lance of the SCPD. Rivers, the guy that knocked you out and tried to attack Felicity in this office has broken out of Iron Heights. Captain Lance wanted to make sure Miss Smoak would be on her guard until he's safely captured," said Oliver in a quietly serious tone.

Ray's expression suddenly went from his normal congenial openness to one of concern as Oliver spoke. Ray stepped towards Oliver.

"Of course, is there anything I can do? Double the Security detail in the building? Post a guard outside Felicity's office perhaps?" said Ray.

"Ahh, no, that….," started Felicity, who was cut off by Palmer. Oliver opened his mouth as if to reply to Palmer's first question, but was also cut off by Palmer rambling on about suggestions for tightened security around Felicity, who was holding up a finger and trying to get Ray's attention.

"What about extra CCTV cameras? Perhaps we can install a few more? I think you should consider a bodyguard, I think I'm going to go and order one right now…," said Ray, turning as if to leave the office.

"Ray!" Felicity suddenly shouted. Both men looked at Felicity, and Ray finally fell silent.

"Those are all great ideas, but I'm as safe as I need to be," said Felicity calmly, looking at Ray but her words for the benefit of both men.

"And I'll be keeping close by," said Oliver.

"Oh, right. I see. Sorry, I didn't realise you were…," said Ray bumbling over his words and looking from Felicity to Oliver and back again.

Felicity felt her face flushing hot and wasn't sure where to look, but she stole a glance at Oliver whose expression seemed to indicate he was slightly pleased with himself.

"Well, I'll let you get on. I'll see you after work," said Oliver, turning to face Felicity, a short tight-lipped smile on his face, and steely determination in his eyes.

"OK," said Felicity in a small quiet voice, the expression on her face alerting Oliver that the pair of them would be continuing this conversation later on at the Arrow cave.

"Nice seeing ya Ray," said Oliver genially, lightly slapping Palmer on the shoulder as he walked out of Felicity's office.

The Jones woman, her accomplice, and Rivers spent the morning checking equipment and pouring over electronic maps and aerial views of the mission site they would be attacking later that evening, displayed on a military grade laptop. Rivers, and the man who had been masquerading as Tyler Barnes, had previous experience of the finite amount of planning the woman employed with all her missions, but her insistence on running through the mission and various worst case and escape scenarios again and again was beginning to try the patience of both men. When she called a break and sent Rivers out for food, both men shared a look of common exhaustion.

Just under two hours later, they had packed all their equipment into the black van and deserted their secret temporary hide out in the semi-constructed building and were travelling in the direction of the mission site, just outside the city limits of Starling. In a sheltered forested area the three practiced their marksmanship and conducted a few sessions of hand to hand combat. The woman's accomplice noted that she didn't pull any of her punches, as he wiped away blood from the corner of his mouth. The look he saw in her eyes gave him cause for concern and he began to worry that, along with the recent incident when she had beaten Peter Corvelli to a pulp, she was edging towards spiralling out of control. Having only seen that happen once before, his gut turned to ice at the thought she might be edging in that direction again.

Later that that day, Felicity sat back in her office chair and breathed out a short sigh, slipping a finger up behind her glasses to rub at a tired eye. She had been working hard on a project for Ray Palmer all morning, alongside continuing the background checks on Tyler Barnes and Hal Harkness, and had also been trying to break the code of Peter Corvelli's last text. When her assistant Jerry came in to ask her if he could get her a coffee, she turned the table on his request and offered to get Jerry a take-away latte as she needed a walk around the block.

Twenty minutes later, having had a stroll outside in the cool air of a fresh spring day, Felicity stepped up to the crosswalk opposite the Palmer Technology building and awaited the green "Walk" sign from the display box across the other side of the street; clutching two lattes via their coffee collar cardboard sleeves. Felicity looked up at the clouds forming above her knowing it would be raining later on. She brought her eyes down to street level and watched as the traffic sped past her, distractedly looking at the colours and types of the vehicles, and she spotted an out of state licence plate. And then a thought hit her as if a vehicle had swerved off the pavement and run into her. What if Peter's text wasn't code? What if it was a licence plate?

Gripping both coffee containers, Felicity darted across the street, fortunately as the traffic was slowing down as the lights changed, and she hurtled across the open plaza beyond and back into the Palmer Technologies HQ. As she emerged from the elevator on the 39th floor, she ran towards her office. Jerry leapt from behind his desk at this sight, but before he could say anything, Felicity had handed both coffee cartons over to him and had run into her office and behind her desk. Still remaining standing up she frantically tapped her fingers across her keyboard.

It was only an idea, she could be wrong, but something in her gut told Felicity Smoak she was on to the right track.

John returned from his shower to find Roy standing over Felicity's workstation and staring at the central monitor.

"You know she doesn't like us touching her stuff," deadpanned John as he approached the workstation.

John could see that Roy was watching the Mayor making a televised statement about the events at Iron Heights last night, assuring the public that everything was being done to keep Starling City safe. Flanked by suits and uniforms, and with flashbulbs going off, the Mayor finished his statement with an announcement that the Regeneration project had just received a sizeable donation from Hal Harkness, and that with "friends of Starling like Mr Harkness and Dr Palmer" on board with the Mayor's project, it meant the city was now looking towards a bright future.

"Not one mention of Rivers being out on the loose," said Roy, who glanced across at the monitor on the far left where a picture of Tyler Barnes was displayed, and reams of electronic data was coursing through a text box, as Felicity's search algorithm continued. John noted Roy's hard expression.

"Thea will be OK," soothed John, "Oliver won't let anything happen to her."

Roy was silent for a moment and stared at the image of Barnes, and then he stood up, reaching for his jacket, which he had hooked over the back of Felicity's chair.

"I'm going to check out the route Peter took on the way home the night he was attacked," said Roy.

"Want some company?" said John.

"Sure."

With the information that Cin had already given him, plus knowing the location of Peter's apartment, and where the police had found his beaten body, Roy judged that there were a couple of short cuts that would have taken Peter home on the night he was attacked. Roy's first instinct was to head down the quicker, and more dangerous, of the two routes, and it was as the two men walked on this narrow road that they came upon the condemned building that the woman and her accomplice had used as their first hideout when they returned to Starling City.

"What's that?" muttered Roy as his eye caught something small and red lying in the stubble of weeds and concrete by the wall of the condemned building on their right. Roy bent down to pick the item up, and his stomach lurched. It was a small metal pin badge bearing the Superman crest. Peter's mother had given him the badge because he was a fan of the comics, and because she referred to him as her "little Superman" for the way he had been taking care of her since she was diagnosed with her illness.

"Is it the boy's?" said John, and was greeted by a short nod from Roy. John looked up at the edifice of the building, and then stepped towards the boarded up rear door and pulled at it. It gave way easily, and John stepped inside, closely followed by Roy.

Though it was daylight outside, the building was in gloom due to the windows being boarded up, and no electricity available for the overhead lights. John and Roy took a few moments to adjust their eyes to the dark and began to slowly walk around, cautious with their footing in the condemned building. John stepped off to the left and crouched down, noticing that the dust on the floor had been disturbed and he reached down to pick up a piece of filed metal, like a shaving from a drill bit. John also noticed a smell in the air that seemed strangely familiar.

"What's that smell?" said Roy as he approached John.

"I think it's some kind of oil," muttered John.

"Yeah, it looks like they spilled some," said Roy, who stepped past John and walked further into the cold concrete room where there was a dark stain pattern on the floor. As John walked over and bent down to get a closer look, he realised it wasn't oil.

"It's blood," he breathed.

There was a moment of still silence and then Roy's mobile phone started ringing, which jolted both men. Roy answered the call, which was from Felicity, Roy thumbed the icon that put Felicity on speakerphone and her eager babbling speed emerged from the phone into the empty echoing space around them.

"Hey, I think I've figured out Peter Corvelli's text. It's a licence plate, well a partial one. He's mistakenly typed in the letter O instead of a zero, it's an easy mistake to make when you're walking along let alone running scared for your life; but I found the vehicle. It's actually popped up in connection with the attack on the federal transport and the riot at Iron Heights, so I guess there is a link with everything that's been happening the past week. I back-tracked with CCTV to the approximate time Peter was attacked and it was seen at the corner of Temple Street," said Felicity before pausing for breath and staring at the monitor on her desk at Palmers, showing the location of Roy's phone, and continuing in a surprised tone, "which is where you are right now. That's not a coincidence is it?"

"No. John and I were following Peter's probable route home, we found something that belonged to him outside a condemned building. We found blood on the floor inside," said Roy flatly.

"Get a sample back to the Foundry, we can analyse it. I'll carry on scanning CCTV for the black van," said Felicity gently.

Special Agent Morgan looked out of the window in her hospital room, scanning the skyline of Starling City spread out before her, almost as if she was searching for something. Her situation was bordering on the precarious; there were too many unknown factors at work, and players in place, for her to keep any degree of control over. And she hated not being in control. She hadn't worked this hard, for this long, and sacrificed so much, to have everything fall apart now.

Dipping her head and sighing out gently she seemed to come to the conclusion she had been searching for as she looked out of the window. Leaning heavily on the cane that the physiotherapist had given her to aid walking she limped over to her nightstand by her bed and picked up her mobile phone. Tapping in the number she held the phone to her ear and listened as the dial tone rang out twice.

"How did you get this number?" said the deep male voice at the other end of the line.

"You know who I am. The fact that I've called you should give you some indication of the seriousness of the matter I need to discuss with you," said Morgan with cool determination.

There was a brief pause at the other end of the line, as if the man was considering this statement, before he finally replied.

"Go to the corner of 6th and Wiltshire in one hour. A car will be sent for you," said the man before the line went dead.

Morgan swallowed hard, realising that like Alice she was about to head down a rabbit hole into the unknown, and Morgan was pretty certain there wouldn't be a land of wonder awaiting her.

Laurel Lance winced as she rinsed her hands under the warm water in the ladies room near her desk at the DAs office in downtown Starling. Laurel twisted her arm around and noticed there was a bruise forming on the soft flesh near her elbow joint; a souvenir from her physical activity at Iron Heights the night before. Laurel's mind flashed back to the time she had walked into the treatment room at Starling General and caught sight of her sister Sara's back covered in scars. Laurel remembered how scared she had been for her baby sister when she'd seen the results of the violent life she was leading. And here I am now thought Laurel, treading that same path.

When Laurel emerged from the ladies room she was surprised to see Ted Grant standing near her desk. Surprised but not unhappily so, as a memory of last night flashed through her mind and brought a flush to her cheek.

"Hey," said Laurel.

"Hey," said Ted, wanting to step forward and kiss her, but realising it was Laurel's place of work and not wanting to embarrass her.

"What are you doing here?" said Laurel stepping around her desk.

"This is probably not the place to talk," said Ted quietly as he looked about him, "can we go outside, grab a coffee or something?"

"Sure," said Laurel, a small quiet concern biting at her emotions over the serious expression on Grant's face.

Ten minutes later, Ted and Laurel found themselves sitting on a bench in one of the small manicured park areas that were dotted around downtown Starling. Ted hadn't said anything apart from asking Laurel what her coffee preference was when they had stopped at an open air cart near the park entrance.

Ted cleared his throat and turned to face Laurel, but he looked away from her before he could say what he wanted to.

"Are you OK?" said Laurel calmly, leaning forward to place a hand on his leg.

"Me? That was going to be my question to you," said Ted.

"I don't understand," said Laurel.

"Laurel I saw you at Iron Heights, you were…different, like something had taken over you. I know you can take care of yourself, I know you can fight, but you were throwing yourself into one dangerous situation after another. I'm worried what happens the next time, or the time after, because I know you won't stop doing this," said Ted, his eyes full of concern.

Laurel put her coffee carton down on the bench beside her and shifted her seated position closer to Ted.

"You're right I won't stop trying to help, because it's the best way I know to honour my sister," said Laurel with calm yet fierce determination, grabbing Ted's left hand with both her own, "but I will be more careful, you can help me to be more careful, more controlled."

"Laurel, I don't know…this thing with you and me, it's something I don't want to mess up, but you have to know that I don't agree with what you're doing. I've been where you are remember, on the streets fighting to make a difference, and look how that turned out. I don't want that for you," said Ted placing his coffee carton on the ground and reaching up his right hand to caress the side of Laurel's face.

Laurel reached up a hand to hold his in place on her cheek, her eyes moist with emotion.

"Then help me, by training me and teaching me how to be more careful out there," said Laurel looking deep into Ted's eyes, "because I don't want to mess this up either."

Special Agent Morgan argued politely but firmly with her doctor as she discharged herself from Starling General Hospital, promising to continue with physiotherapy for her injuries, promising to continue to take the pain medication he prescribed, and promising to seek further and immediate medical advice if she took a turn for the worse. The doctor sighed heavily as he signed the discharge papers, Morgan having only briefly scanned them before she scribbled her signature on the dotted line.

The federal officer posted outside her door was hesitant to allow her to leave hospital but his rank was junior and he couldn't refuse a direct order from a superior, so upon that order being forthcoming he helped Morgan with her bags to his car parked downstairs and took her back to her rented apartment in downtown Starling. Once the federal officer had been dismissed, no doubt to head straight to the local FBI HQ to make a report about Morgan's sudden decision to leave hospital and refuse close protection, Kate slipped out of the back entrance to her apartment building, and slowly walked to the next block.

Her progress wasn't fast, but she had left her cane behind for fear of being noticeable, as she tried to attract the attention of a passing taxi. When one came, she directed the driver to the corner of 6th and Wiltshire. When the taxi dropped her there Morgan barely had time to marshal her thoughts before a black sedan car pulled up alongside her and the front passenger got out, to open and hold the rear door for her. Morgan took a slow brief look at the large man in the suit, noticing the tell-tale bulge in his jacket just under the armpit, and the cold expression in his eyes. She returned his hard stare and settled herself in the back seat of the car. As the vehicle pulled away from the kerb, heading south the man in the passenger seat barked out a sentence, not bothering to turn to look at Morgan.

"Put on the blindfold and lay down on the back seat." Morgan glanced to her left and saw the mask of thick black cloth lying on the seat beside her.

As Morgan complied with the request, she tried to settle her mind and ran over again what she was going to say to the man, the very dangerous man, she was going to meet.

Morgan estimated the car journey must have taken at least ten minutes, there were various right and left turns, and at one point she heard drilling so they had passed by a building site or perhaps some highway workers. The car finally came to a stop and she heard the sound of the car door being opened, followed by feeling a firm grip on her arm as she was forcefully pulled from the car and assisted with walking. The air around her felt cool, and smelled vaguely damp. Suddenly she felt two hands on her upper arms from the front and she stood still. Her eyes adjusted to the dim light of the room she was in as the mask was taken off of her face. Morgan bit down her fear as she saw she was in a cellar. Boxes and crates were piled along the walls on her right, a single empty chair was in front of her, and the two men who had been in the car with her were standing each side of the chair, their feet apart, like sentinels.

Suddenly from behind a door opened with a creak and two men entered dressed head to toe in black suits, shirts and ties. They took positions on either side of the door, behind Morgan, as a third man entered and walked over to the chair and sat down. Morgan looked at Hal Harkness, in his expensive grey suit, a flash of diamond on his cufflinks, and his imported leather shoes, as she tried to control her breathing and her emotions. She had to stay calm and think. Her goal was to persuade this man that what she was about to say was in his best interests. If she couldn't do that everything was lost and she may very well not leave this room alive.

The tension in the air was palpable and Morgan took a step forward, prompting the same action from all the bodyguards in the room. Hal held up a hand and smiled.

"Gentlemen please relax, Ms Morgan means me no harm," said Harkness, his eyes twinkling with good humour but his mouth set firm, not permitting a smile, as he stared at Morgan, "that's right isn't it?"

"Mr Harkness we have been very useful to each other and I've risked a lot to assist you…," started Morgan, her voice cool and measured.

"I do hope this isn't the preamble to asking for a rise," said Harkness, distractedly looking at his recent manicure.

"You're in danger. I'm here to help you," said Morgan firmly.

"Help me? How?" said Harkness raising his head to look at Morgan, suddenly more interested in the woman standing before him than in perusing his nails.

Felicity wasn't at all surprised to see Oliver leaning nonchalantly against her car in the basement car park of the Palmer Technologies building when she finished work that afternoon. He was holding firm in his resolve to make sure she was safe whilst Rivers was on the run from prison. There was no evidence to suggest that Rivers was going to harm Felicity, but as he had tried to do so twice before, Oliver was listening to his gut instincts and hedging all bets. Or as Felicity would have said, statistical correlations never lie.

Felicity had managed to remotely programme an algorithm to scour CCTV footage, both archived and real-time, to search for the black van with the licence plate Peter Corvelli had tried so hard to alert the SCPD to. The search results had thrown up one of two interesting things, which Felicity immediately started to summarise once she strode into the Arrow cave, Oliver following hard on her heels. John and Roy were standing by the blood analyser machine as Felicity strode past. She walked over to her workstation, talking as she went, throwing her jacket over the back of her chair, and dumping her handbag on the corner of the desk, behind the right-hand monitor.

"OK so here's the thing, I wasn't expecting to find a lot of CCTV images of the van because I assumed whoever was driving it would dump it or camouflage it. The algorithm I created was searching for a black van with a specific licence plate. So I was a bit surprised to find this," said Felicity, typing frantically across her keyboard, and bringing up images on all three monitors on her workstation. Oliver, John and Roy walked over to look at the monitors. Felicity briefly pointed a light blue painted nail at the monitor nearest to her.

"These images were from last night on the northbound highway. This image shows the van turning off the highway and heading towards the woodland that borders the back of the Iron Heights prison complex. The van is then seen again about an hour after the riot starts, heading back into Starling. There's been one final sighting, about three hours ago, heading for the northbound highway again. It disappeared off down a dirt track and hasn't reappeared on CCTV yet."

"What's this image?" said John pointing at the middle screen.

"That as far as I can work out is the van arriving in Starling three days ago. It parked up in a garage just off Temple Street, before moving off to a semi-built apartment complex on the other side of town, from where it left to head to Iron Heights last night."

"Did you get a sample of the blood you found?" said Felicity, briefly glancing at Roy. Felicity had updated Oliver in the car journey on the way to the Foundry about her phone call with John and Roy earlier that day.

"It's Peter's," said Roy by way of grim confirmation of their find earlier.

"So if we have a history of where the van's been the past three days and we know where it is now, what are these images?" said Oliver standing by the monitor on the far left of Felicity's workstation.

"That is the van parked two streets away from the warehouse of the Palmer Technologies Applied Sciences Division the night of the attack on Starling nearly two months ago. I also have images of it parked near the warehouse where Oliver was held prisoner," said Felicity, swivelling in her chair and looking at the combined surprise on the faces of the male portion of Team Arrow, "they haven't changed the licence plate."

"Are they stupid or just cocky?" said Roy, looking at John and Oliver.

"No-one was looking for a link between all these events. We didn't even believe there was one until today," said John.

"Who's in the van?" said Oliver calmly, knowing almost imperceptibly that he knew the answer before Felicity said it.

"Apart from the addition of Rivers over the past 24 hours, I can only find images of two people getting into and out of that van. And both of them look suspiciously familiar," said Felicity a she hit a few more keys and brought up two screen shot boxed images of two figures emerging from the black van, which when Felicity zoomed in showed one as male and one as female. Felicity also made the image of the "fake nurse" Sergeant Burrows had chased at Starling General appear on screen, and an image of Tyler Barnes leaning on the bar at Verdant. The appearance of the female in the van was uncannily similar to that of the "fake nurse". The image of the male suspect was less clear but he had the same size and build as Thea's new friend.

"What the hell?" muttered John as he leant forward to look at the images displayed on the central monitor.

"What was she doing at the Palmer warehouse?" said Oliver.

"I'm pretty sure it was a robbery. I've accessed the last inventory of the warehouse and there are a couple of items missing," said Felicity, "The items were deemed small scale theft, possibly an inside job, and of limited value, so it was written off as an acceptable equipment loss."

"What was taken?" said John.

"A small telescopic sight that was awaiting a patent, and an aseptic reinforced pressurised canister for transporting chemicals," said Felicity.

"What the hell does she want those for?" said Roy, his brow creased in surprise.

"Whatever it is, I don't think we have much time to find out. Suit up," said Oliver to Roy.

"Wait, there's something else," said Felicity bent over her desk and frantically typing on her keyboard. The images displayed on the central monitor changed, with data boxes flashing up one over another. Oliver threw a confused glance at Felicity, whilst John and Roy stared mystified at the monitor.

"Lyla told John about Harkness being on an ARGUS watchlist. Since there's this connection between all the events that have been happening recently I wondered who else might be on that list."

"You hacked ARGUS?" said Roy, his eyebrows raised up his forehead.

"Just a bit," said Felicity, who stood upright and waved a hand in the direction of the central monitor, "and it turns out someone we are watching is someone ARGUS is watching."

Oliver, Roy and John looked at the monitor displaying an electronic ARGUS file, a picture of the woman in the top left hand corner of the file.

Morgan was actually surprised how easy it had been to convince Hal Harkness that the Jones woman and her accomplice were a danger to his organisation. Perhaps Harkness already had his doubts about the pair, and Morgan's persuasive words had therefore been coincidental to his own thinking, but whatever the reason, Morgan was beyond relieved and happy to place the blindfold back over her face again and leave her cellar interview with Harkness some twenty minutes later.

Morgan's situation was still finely balanced and there was more work to do, but as she hailed another taxi after having been dropped off in downtown Starling, she knew she had more control over her future and that she would do anything to make sure her plan was a success. The next few hours were the most crucial to that success, and the next person she had to talk to would be integral in making it a success.

Special Agent Morgan limped up to the doorway of Captain Lance's office at SCPD headquarters and tapped her walking stick against the doorframe; having gone to retrieve this from her apartment after she was dropped off by Harkness's men. Having seen something of the Captain's softer emotions when he visited her in the hospital, Morgan rationalised that the walking stick might be useful tool in steering him towards the course of action she needed him to take.

"Come in," muttered Lance rather distractedly as he perused a report on screen. His eyes flicked to the doorway and then he immediately stood up, surprised to see Morgan standing there.

"They let you out?" said Lance, his face contorting in a bemused crease.

"I let me out," said Morgan, limping into the room and making for the chair in front of Lance's desk. Lance scuffled quickly around his desk and assisted Morgan to sit down. Lance leaned against the front of his desk and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Is this wise?" said Lance gently.

"Probably not," said Morgan shifting in the chair and wincing sharply, "but we don't have time to talk about my troubles; we have less than an hour to stop a very dangerous individual stealing something that could kill everyone in this city."

A vague suspicion that had been circulating around the brain of John Diggle for the past couple of days turned into something far more substantial once the information Felicity had managed to hack from the ARGUS database was displayed on screen. Not only was Hal Harkness on an ARGUS watch list, which John already knew about, but the woman was too.

John knew how secretive the work Lyla engaged in was, and that she probably saw herself as protecting someone she loved by not telling John everything. He had been a soldier himself, and was now part of a secret organisation run by a former vigilante, so Diggle knew the value and the weight of secrets; but this was different.

"John, are you OK? You kinda look like you're about to explode," said Felicity with mock seriousness.

"If you're thinking that Lyla should have told you…," said Oliver calmly.

"She should have told me," said John, his anger barely concealed by his quiet intensity.

"….she was doing her job. Her secrets keep you safe, Sara safe, everyone safe," said Oliver.

"Says the man whose whole life is a secret," said John coolly.

The two men looked at each other, knowing that they were on the same side, knowing that they trusted each other with their lives, but seemingly divided by a gulf of understanding. They were on opposite sides of this argument, Oliver could only sympathise with Lyla's predicament; he had been there himself. John could only feel the frustration of a loved one left out in the cold.

As if she knew that she was being spoken about Lyla Michaels phoned John's mobile. Diggle connected the call and put Lyla on speakerphone, placing the mobile phone on the steel surface of Felicity's workstation. The lack of a greeting from her partner, and the stark silence at his end of the mobile, spoke volumes.

"You know," said Lyla in a firm small voice.

"Yeah we know," said John, puffing out a breath.

"We?" said Lyla.

"We're at the Foundry Lyla," said Oliver stepping forward to speak in the direction of the mobile phone, "and we don't have a lot of time. I know Waller must have you buttoned down but we have to know what you know. This woman is planning something and time is running out."

There was a pause at the other end of the line, as if Lyla was weighing up her options, and then she sighed slowly.

"Her name is Mikita Jones, but she hates any mention of her name, she just goes by The Woman most of the time," said Lyla. Oliver threw a quick look at Felicity, who was already typing the woman's name into several hacked federal databases.

"Is she ARGUS?" said John, his eyes blazing with frustration.

"No. She's never been with us or any government trained organisation as far as we can tell. Her husband was, with ARGUS I mean. Lewis Jones, ex-SAS and Navy Seals, one of our best operatives," said Lyla.

"Was?"

"Lewis Jones was killed five years ago in an explosion in west Africa," said Felicity, tapping away at her keyboard and reading on screen a succession of items that she had gleaned from hacking into an ARGUS archive.

"How do you know that?" said a mystified Lyla Michaels.

"Oh don't ask," said Felicity nonchalantly tapping away at her keyboard.

"I am asking," said Lyla sternly.

"Umm," said Felicity, her fingers paused over her keypad.

"Lyla, I think the point here is that ARGUS knows a lot more than we do, and anything ARGUS knows might be helpful right now," said John, stepping towards Felicity's desk, his eyes blazing as he stared at his mobile phone.

"Five years ago Lewis Jones was tasked with bringing some highly classified data back to the US from a top level source in the west African military. Jones was betrayed by a local informer and his team and mission were compromised. The mission had high sensitivity, and there was zero accountability; Lewis knew this before he went overseas. Waller gave the order for a drone strike, taking out the informer, plus Jones and his entire team."

"Lyla!" said John, rubbing a hand over his face. Oliver dipped his head, this was classic Waller in self-defence mode; he'd seen it on more than one occasion over the last few years.

"There was a clear and present danger to ARGUS and other allied special forces operatives in the area, and if the information that Jones had on him had been stolen and had got on the open market it would have meant the deaths of hundreds of agents working against international terrorism," said Lyla, stating her case with firm intention.

"So Mikita Jones turns from grieving widow into armed terrorist? I don't get it," said Roy.

"It's a little more complicated than that. Mikita Jones was an army brat, she travelled with her father to all his overseas postings, but to all intents and purposes she was a civilian. And we thought she had died in the drone strike," said Lyla.

"You let her husband take her with him on his mission?" said Felicity aghast.

"She was working with an international aid charity, she often had postings that were in locations close to some of his mission targets," explained Lyla, "From local intel sources we discovered that she flew in and surprised him in Kinshasa City two days before the drone strike."

"Ain't love grand. So what happened to her?" said Jon tersely.

"Our agent on the ground verified there were no survivors, and that Mikita had been with her husband less than 12 hours before the drone strike hit. We had no luck tracing her so assumed she had died with him. But a couple of years ago we started picking up random intel about a woman matching her description who was offering specialist skills for hire. She's killed at least one ARGUS agent sent to track her, and she hit one of our resource drops, she she's very well equipped. Waller put her on our wanted list, and then she disappeared, no more sightings, no more intel. Until that is several weeks ago when she organised the attack on Starling City," said Lyla blowing out a breath and preparing herself for the reaction to this last statement.

"That was her? You knew?" said John.

"We suspected, but couldn't prove anything until it was too late and she'd disappeared again," said Lyla firmly.

"The attack wasn't the work of a civilian. Killing the ARUS trained agent wasn't the work of a civilian," said Oliver calmly and slowly, "what happened to her?"

"Lewis Jones' specialist area was logistics, organisational tactics, and sharpshooting. We can only guess he taught her a few things. She grew up around the military; maybe she had an aptitude for it. Maybe after she escaped the drone strike she may have offered herself up to the anti-government militia in the area. Her knowledge would have been useful to them, and in return she may have been trained by them. Who knows," sighed Lyla.

"I'm surprised Waller hasn't recruited her in to the Suicide Squad," said Roy.

"About three years ago Waller reached out with an offer of service. Waller had recruited Lewis Jones and they worked a lot of missions together. Waller was impressed with Mikita's work. She thought bringing her into the fold might take some of the edge off the guilt she felt about the drone strike that took out Lewis and his team. The agent Waller sent to talk to Mikita was sent back in three body bags. Waller placed an immediate cease and destroy hit on Mikita, on sight, no capture. This one is personal for Waller," said Lyla gravely.

Oliver thumped the desk and made Felicity jump in her seat. Oliver rarely lost his temper, so this was testament to the anger he felt towards Waller. They had a long and complex history, one that the rest of team Arrow was only discovering bit by bit. Oliver leaned on Felicity's desk and then breathed out and stood up.

"Mikita Jones is a gun for hire; therefore she has to rely on a paymaster. Someone is behind her. We need to find out who that is. Find the paymaster, find the woman," said Oliver in his gravel burr.

When Felicity's mobile started buzzing on the desk by her right hand she almost jumped again, such was the level of her attention focussed on Oliver's expression and words.

It was Captain Lance, with some interesting news.

 **Chapter Eight**

The drama about to take place had been staged and set by Special Agent Morgan, although as the director she knew she didn't have total control over the cast of characters involved, whether they would stick to the "script" that she had created, and therefore she had no certainty how the drama would end that night. Morgan's fate was in the hands of blind luck and the actions of others, but she was satisfied that she had done everything she could to protect herself, down to planning a final exit strategy which was held in absolute reserve if things didn't go her way over the next few hours.

Having convinced Hal Harkness that Mikita Jones and her accomplice were a danger to his organisation, and were close to revealing his secret identity to the great and the good of Starling, like his new friend the Mayor, Morgan had been able to persuade Harkness that cutting both of them loose, on a permanent basis, was the only way he could preserve his secret and his crime empire. Though she didn't know the full extent of the trials and tribulations of Harkness's background she knew enough of his history, and enough of the man himself, to chisel away at weak spots in his character, his over-weaning ambition and his vanity, to trigger his knack for self-preservation.

Morgan had told Harkness that Jones had been nothing but reckless in breaking Rivers out of Iron Heights in such a public way, that she was already on an ARGUS watchlist, that she had left Peter Corvelli alive, and had raised the suspicions of the SCPD; hell she'd almost been caught by Sergeant Burrows at the hospital. Before long, if Jones wasn't stopped, her actions would result in the combined forces of state and federal investigators finding the link from her to Harkness, and Morgan would be useless to him in that event. But Morgan could help him now, to resolve the situation and stop it from escalating.

"Jones is out of control, she can't be trusted anymore," said Morgan to Harkness, stepping forward again; this time getting no reaction from the four man bodyguard unit in the cellar.

"What do you suggest?" said Harkness calmly, as Morgan tried not to smile.

Morgan's plan involved tipping off the SCPD and federal authorities not only to Jones, her accomplice and Rivers, but also involved orchestrating their capture whilst committing a criminal act that a "business" associate of Harkness had hired them for; based on a recommendation from Harkness himself. Harkness would lose out on the payoff from the sale of the item that Jones and her team were tasked with stealing, as he had demanded a cut of the proceeds as the theft was taking place in his "area", but as Morgan explained there would always be other paydays, and other guns for hire that could be found when Harkness needed a dirty job done. If Mikita Jones was allowed to remain at large there was a real and present danger that Harkness would be exposed and his ambitious plans for expansion of his crime empire would shatter into nothing but dust.

When Morgan limped into Quentin Lance's office, wincing with the pain of her injuries, asking for a glass of water to take her medication, his reaction to her assumed tenacity and passion for her job told her the plan she had set forth had a good chance of success. Morgan quickly detailed to Lance about the tip off she'd received about a truck heist scheduled to take place in the next two hours on the outskirts of Starling, that the item the criminals wanted to steal could be used to kill everyone in Starling, and that the heist would be led by the woman responsible for the attack on Starling City two months ago and involved the escaped convict Rivers.

With time running out, Lance started making phone calls and giving orders to his team, mobilising an armed response, calling in back up support from off duty officers, and involving Morgan in all his decision making. Morgan was reliant on her reading of Lance and his character, his connection to the vigilante, his loyalty and passion to his job, his team and his city, for the next stage of the plan to work; but if his immediate and comprehensive reaction to her tip off report was anything to go by, the signs were looking good for success.

The Arrow and his team had been immediately prepared to go into action after Felicity had revealed the information she had found out about the woman, Mikita Jones, and by the revelations made by Lyla Michaels; but there had been no definite event for Team Arrow to focus their attention on. When the call came through from Quentin Lance the focus was revealed; the truck heist.

Lance, thinking himself talking to the Arrow, but in actuality on speaker phone to everyone in the Arrow cave, detailed the tip off received from federal sources about a three truck convoy with armed support in unmarked cars which had left a government biochemical facility sixty miles south of Starling City about an hour ago. It would shortly pass close to the outskirts of Starling on I-5 before heading north to a military facility just across the state line. Lance said the compound being transported was highly toxic and could wipe out the population of Starling if it entered the water system.

The SCPD and a team of federal officers were on route to intercept the convoy to provide further protection, but judging from the tip off received from Special Agent Morgan even this amount of protection might not be enough to secure the transport from attack by Jones and her team.

"Hence my call to you," said Lance, his tone deadly serious, "we need to keep this stuff under lock and key and out of Jones's hands. Morgan says she's out of control and has to be stopped before she does something unthinkable."

"Agreed Detective," said Oliver, his voice disguised by the camouflage software embedded in his mobile phone, "I'm on my way."

"You don't know where the trucks are," said Lance bemused.

"I've got someone already on the case," said Oliver looking at Felicity, who smiled as her fingers flew across her keyboard, accessing maps, and hacking federal GPS monitoring and CCTV images.

"You know if Miss Smoak ever gets fed up with working for you I'll gladly give her a job," said Lance before ending the call.

"John and I will take the van, Roy take the bike," said Oliver heading towards the display case containing his bow.

By the time that the male portion of Team Arrow were suited, equipped, and on route, the clouds that had been gathering all day had built up in the darkened night sky to grumble with thunder. Rain began to fall lightly, but steadily, forcing John, driving the van, and Roy, on Oliver's motorcycle, to focus on their driving skills as they tore south through the streets of Starling City at speed. The wet pavements and streets glowed bright in the artificial street light as they raced through puddles, sending plumes of spray up over the sidewalks.

Back at the Arrow cave, Felicity was accessing any data she could get her hands on in order to prepare the way for her friends as they headed into battle. She fed co-ordinates, levels of police and federal response to the pending attack, a report on the location of the truck convoy, and even a weather report predicting a bad storm front due to hit Starling within the hour, through the Bluetooth device in her ear which connected her to John, Roy and Oliver. Felicity had counted them out of the Arrow cave less than ten minutes earlier, she was determined to do all she could so that she could safely count them all back later on.

"Lance and his officers are in four SCPD squad cars, plus there are two cars full of armed feds," said Felicity as her eager eyes scanned the two monitors nearest her, "they've just arrived at the back of the convoy. Looks like two of the squad cars are accelerating to take up point."

John smirked at Felicity's easy use of military terminology, one that she would probably never have developed if she hadn't of met Oliver Queen.

"Roger that, we can see the back of the convoy," said John as he accelerated slightly, looking through the windscreen of the van to see the red tail lights of the vehicles less than a hundred yards up ahead of him. John was grateful that the bad weather and the late hour had kept traffic and pedestrians to a minimum in and around Starling City. The last thing they needed was to worry about collateral damage to innocent bystanders.

The first rocket grenade came out of nowhere, sending one of the accelerating SCPD squad cars crashing in to the back of its fellow vehicle in front of it, the two cars careening off of the road and on to the grass verge to the left to both crash into a copse of trees.

The next two shots took out the types of the trucks at the front and back of the convoy, causing the truck at the rear to swerve violently into the path of one of the unmarked federal cars driving alongside it. The driver of the front truck wrestled violently with his steering wheel and jammed a foot down on his brake pedal as his vehicle threatened to jack-knife across the roadway. The remaining truck, carrying the toxic chemical, and the remaining SCPD and federal vehicles immediately slowed down, swerving to avoid crashing into the truck in front of them. Smoke curled from the damaged vehicles and there was a moment of surreal calm, with the falling rain providing the only noise as it slapped down on to the tarmac and all the now stationary vehicles.

Armed officers struggled out of the crashed vehicles and took cover against the sides of their cars as automatic gunfire started to pour out across the area. Oliver saw at least three blasts of gunfire off to the right from a cluster of trees set back from the grass verge, and his acute hearing caught another targeted rocket launched from off to the left, near to the lead truck, now stationary and smoking from the previous rocket attack.

"Roy get up front, watch your left," said Oliver into his chest mounted communication device.

"Got it!" yelled Roy as he accelerated the bike up the road, weaving through the stationary cars.

"Dig, get over to the right, up behind the middle truck," said Oliver.

All the vehicles had now come to a stop, the road ahead and behind blocked by the damaged trucks in front and behind, and any movement forward or backward being curtailed by heavy bursts of gunfire from both sides of the roadway, the gunmen hidden by the copse of trees on both sides of the grass verge. It was a classic ambush situation.

Another rocket grenade was launched, this time hitting the middle truck, ripping a hole between the cab and the articulated container behind it. Hot electrical sparks flew in all directions as the metal casing of the container and its pressurised air hose were ripped from the vehicle. The two men in the cab of the truck, leapt out of the vehicle, both holding machine guns, and fired off volleys of shots towards the trees on each side of the grass verge as they tried to locate their assailants. Two perfectly aimed sniper shots took out these men and they fell still clutching their firing guns on to the wet roadway. Up above there was a flash of sheet lightning and a massive rumble of thunder.

Lance and the two officers in the same car as him struggled out of their vehicle, one officer receiving a bullet wound to the upper thigh as the three of them edged around the back of the car. Lance took out his service revolver, breathing hard, feeling a growing tightness across his chest. Not now, he thought, not now.

Up ahead Roy, dressed as Arsenal, slowed the motorcycle and dismounted, kicking out the stabiliser bar and leaving the bike behind the first truck, before he began moving around the back and edged his way along the side of the vehicle's rear container, an arrow with an explosive tip poised in his bow and ready to fire. Two federal officers began edging around their vehicle, off to Roy's left, intermittently firing shots towards the copse of trees a hundred yards adjacent to them. One of the men nodded at Roy as if ready to provide cover for anything he was planning. Roy lifted the bow and aimed the arrow towards the trees and fired. As the resulting explosion went off, Roy and the two feds made a run towards the trees, the officers firing their weapons, and Roy loading another arrow.

Disorientated, and with blood dripping down the side of his face, Rivers suddenly appeared from the left hand side of the copse of trees and began firing his assault weapon, hitting one of the federal officers in the chest, and wounding the second in the shoulder and arm. Rivers saw the figure in red leather aiming an arrow at him, and turned to fire. Both River's bullets and Arsenal's arrow barely missed their targets, as both men dived for cover. When Roy got to his feet again, Rivers was gone. Roy raced for the trees, pulling an arrow out of his quiver ready to load, swivelling his head in all directions searching for Rivers. As Roy reached midway through the copse of trees he heard a sound off to his right and saw the red tail lights of a van in the distance. Roy tapped the Bluetooth earpiece that connected him to Oliver and John.

"Rivers just jumped in a van. Do I stay or follow?" said Roy breathlessly.

"Go!" yelled Oliver in reply, ducking behind a damaged squad car as he narrowly avoided a hail of bullets, "don't let him get away!"

"I'm on it," yelled Roy as he started running towards Oliver's motorcycle, keeping his head down to avoid stray gunfire. Within seconds he was gunning the engine to life and taking off in the direction he'd last seen Rivers heading in.

"Felicity," yelled Oliver over the sound of another burst of gunfire, "Rivers got away in a van, Roy's in pursuit and needs eyes on, do what you can."

"OK," said Felicity, her anxiety levels mounting as the sound of the violence reached her through her earpiece, "scanning traffic cameras in your area."

Now that Rivers had deserted his post, all gunfire was now concentrated on the right hand side of the roadway. Oliver shouted across to John who had taken cover with a wounded SCPD officer against the squad car parked to Oliver's left.

"John, see if you can work your way around," said Oliver, trying not to shout too loudly in case their suggested plan was overheard. John nodded and edged his way along the side of the car, and then ran, head down, along the side of the truck in the middle of the convoy, and then ran to crouch down alongside Lance taking shelter against another SCPD squad car.

"I'm gonna circle around them, anyone up for that?" said John to Lance, who nodded at him. Lance told the officer near him to stay with his injured colleague, and provide cover where he could. Then John and Lance, bent over, started running towards the damaged truck at the end of the convoy and around the back of it, heading off across the grass verge on the right-hand side as quickly as they could.

A bullet ricocheted off the roadway and sliced into the side of the vehicle inches from Oliver, forcing him to break cover and head towards the side of the middle truck. As Oliver ran he loaded an arrow with an exploding tip, and as his sharp eyes caught a burst of gunfire emanating from the copse of trees in front of him, he let loose the arrow. The resulting explosion was accompanied by another massive rumble of thunder and the heavens opened, sending the previous steady rain into a torrential downpour. Amongst the noise and confusion Oliver made a sudden run forwards to the damaged federal car that had crashed to a halt nearest the copse of trees and fired off two more exploding arrows in quick succession, running as fast as he could towards the trees.

Oliver rammed his back against the first tree, a razor sharp arrow already loaded and ready to fire, and paused to wait for a sound to react to. Hearing a noise to his left, he wheeled around the tree and let loose the arrow in the direction of the sound. Oliver heard a short grunt and knew he'd hit something. He loaded another arrow and walked carefully between the trees, his eyes scanning, and ears listening for any noise or movement. The arrow had punctured the lung of the woman's accomplice, who lay on the forest floor breathing shallowly as Oliver approached him. Oliver stepped forward, bent down to pick up the man's weapon and ripped the magazine out of it, throwing it to one side. The man started reaching his right hand towards the pocket of his combat trousers, where Oliver could see another hand gun was stored.

"Really?"growled Oliver as he pulled the bow string back and aimed an arrow at the man's head. The man grabbed hold of the gun, but threw it resignedly away from him out of reach.

A gunshot suddenly rang out just behind Oliver, and he swivelled around to face whoever had fired, his bow string taut ready to let loose an arrow. A federal officer, wounded high on the shoulder, his suit jacket stained with blood, held his left hand palm out to the Arrow; his hand gun still aimed towards the man on the ground in his right hand.

"He was reaching for a gun," said the officer by way of explanation. Oliver's eyes narrowed in anger and he gritted his teeth.

"There's still one more," growled Oliver through his voice modulated camouflage software. The federal officer nodded, and leaned heavily against the nearest tree, gripping his upper arm in pain.

Oliver ran to the edge of the trees abutting the grass verge. The woman was trading fire with Lance, John and an SCPD officer they had picked up as they circled around the back of the convoy. The woman was a crack shot and had all three men pinned down. As Oliver was deciding the best course of action the SCPD officer took a shot to the chest and fell dead on the roadway. Oliver loaded an arrow and fired at the woman, the shot missing her head by a couple of inches. She ducked and circled around the back of the middle truck out of sight. Lance gripped his chest and sank to his knees, scrambling in his jacket pocket for his heart medication, which he quickly swallowed.

Oliver moved forward in a crouching run towards the middle truck, with John moving forwards and from the left, his gun held out before him. The woman suddenly popped out from behind her cover and fired off two close volleys of gunfire, sending both men tumbling to the ground to take cover. Oliver was first back up on his feet and edged closer to the middle truck, his bow string taught and ready to fire.

"It's over Mikita, give up," yelled Oliver through the downpour. Oliver could see John edging closer to his position through his peripheral vision, but there was no movement from the woman. Oliver indicated with his head to John in the direction of the woman and the two men started to walk with stealth in her direction.

Suddenly the engine of a car started up ahead of them. One of the SCPD squad cars had been damaged in the initial attack, and was riven with bullet holes, but it fired to life and provided the perfect getaway car for Mikita Jones as she stabbed her foot down on the accelerator and steered the vehicle across the grass verge in a tight circle, firing out of her open driver side window at Oliver and John as she steered the car back in the direction of Starling.

Having thrown themselves to the ground to avoid the gunfire, both men leapt to their feet after the car had passed them and started running for the van John had parked on the grass verge near the middle truck. John wrenched the steering wheel around as he stamped down on the accelerator, and steered the vehicle in a wide arc to chase after Jones.

As Captain Lance watched the Team Arrow van speed away from him towards Starling City, he was gratified to see the flashing lights of the emergency vehicles that were just approaching at the scene of carnage on the I-5 to tend to the dead and wounded.

With her breathing coming fast and her blood pounding in her veins, Mikita Jones drove at speed towards Starling City and realised that she had been betrayed. The all too sudden arrival of the SCPD, the feds and the masked vigilante meant that someone had informed on her plans to rob the military truck convoy. There were two obvious candidates, Morgan or Harkness. Gone was the cool and efficient machine-like mentality she had relied on for the last few years, all she could think of now was revenge, and all she could feel was the burning shame of failure.

Mikita Jones had not experienced failure and loss in long time, not since Africa five years ago when Waller had given the order that had changed her life forever. Jones felt a surge of renewed hatred for Waller. Waller who had betrayed her husband, betrayed his entire team, and killed them all. The betrayal of Morgan or Harkness was nothing compared to that betrayal. Her focus must now be on Waller, there was no going back, the time was right. Her accomplice and Rivers were probably dead or captured, and she was on her own.

There was no-one to talk her down from spiralling into the darkness this time.

Rivers' only focus should have been trying to get away from Starling City, especially as he knew he was being followed by a masked vigilante dressed in red leather who was on a motorcycle and was catching up to him with every passing minute. All Rivers could think about however was taking his revenge on the blonde in the high rise building who had got in his way twice before. Like Mikita Jones, he burned with a desire for revenge.

Rivers had already made a plan to kidnap Felicity Smoak if the truck heist had been a success, and had already started laying the groundwork for that plan; he saw no reason why he couldn't still carry it out just because the heist had failed. But first of all, he had to shake his tail.

Rivers slammed his foot down on the accelerator pedal and felt the shuddering force of the van speeding up through the driver's seat. Cars slammed on their brakes at the intersections the van streamed through, and a few vehicles shunted into each other as the rain fell from the heavens making the roads slick and wet. Arsenal gritted his teeth, sped up on Oliver's bike, and did his best to try and gain ground on Rivers. Roy was hampered by his need to maintain the chase, whilst not endangering anyone else's life. Rivers however showed no such concern, streaking along at a murderously dangerous speed and weaving through traffic with abandon. Roy lost some ground on Rivers when he braked hard and swerved to avoid a family saloon, and by the time he accelerated again Roy could see River's brake lights blazing red as he flung the van into a left hand turn at speed up ahead.

As Roy turned left at the same junction he had to use all his bodyweight to brake hard and bring the bike to a parallel sliding stop as he almost crashed into the van, which was now parked, the driver side door open, in the middle of the street. Arsenal leapt from the bike, affixed an arrow in his bow, which had been pinioned across the handlebars during the high speed chase, and drawing the bow taut he slowly approached the open door of the van. It was empty. Roy hissed out a curse and started scanning the area. Rivers was nowhere in sight.

Roy pressed a finger to the Bluetooth device in his ear, concealed by his dark red leather hood.

"Felicity, Rivers has dumped the van at…..," started Roy before he was cut off by Felicity. Roy could hear a frantic tapping sound at the other end of the line.

"…Madison and 5th, I saw. OK, scanning traffic cameras and CCTV in your area, and I'm running Rivers through facial recognition software," said Felicity's business-like tones, "OK looks like a possible sighting one block east from your present location. CCTV shows a car-jacking on Wyatt, a woman dragged out of a silver Ford. The car is currently heading towards central Starling."

"Keep your eyes on that car and talk me in. I'm on my way," said Arsenal running towards Oliver's bike and jamming his bow across the handlebars as he gunned the engine to life.

It took Laurel three attempts to get through to her father on his mobile number. Laurel had been fretting about him from the moment she saw the breaking news item on Channel 9 about an attack on a truck convoy on the I-5. Having phoned Lance's office at SCPD headquarters, Laurel was dismayed to hear that Lance had led out the SCPD response vehicles to the attack. Lance's recent heart attack was certainly not cramping her father's ability to rush headlong into danger, ignoring his doctor's, and more importantly, his daughter's warning advice. When it came to taking advice, it was a case of like father like daughter thought Laurel ruefully.

When Laurel finally heard her father's voice at the end of the line, he sounded breathless, but he assured her it was because it was due to him being busy, not at the point of another heart attack. Though he wouldn't go into specifics about the truck heist he told Laurel that it was all over and that he would be shortly be heading to Starling General by ambulance with some of his wounded.

"Listen to me Laurel. Rivers is still on the loose, there's an APB out on him and one of the Arrow's team is after him. Who knows where he's going or what he's gonna do, but he's dangerous and I don't want you running around Starling until he's back behind bars. So stay inside OK?"

"OK," said Laurel ending the call.

Laurel made up her mind in that instant to head to the hospital to see her father so that she could assure herself that he was OK in person. Laurel felt bad lying to her father, but she was itching to do anything to help him, and relive the "high" she felt helping out at Iron Heights. Perhaps if she went to the hospital she might hear about where the Arrow was, and perhaps she might go and help him and his team track down Rivers.

Laurel wondered if Sara felt this way, felt this powerful surge adrenaline, when she was out on the streets fighting, or a mission for the League of Assassins. Laurel felt a sudden pang of emotion, feeling close to her sister, missing her. Sara was forced into the life she ended up living through bad luck and bad accidents. Laurel knew she had a choice; she could turn away from the violence anytime she wanted. Right now however, she was running towards the violence.

Oliver and John sped along in the van, eating up the miles as they headed back into Starling City whilst Felicity monitored the crumpled bullet-riddled SCPD squad car being driven by Mikita Jones via CCTV and traffic cameras. Jones had a head start on John and Oliver, but though she was reaching dangerous levels of speed, with Felicity's accurate information being relayed to the two men they were at least heading in the same direction as Mikita, if not gaining much ground.

"Where the hell is she going?" seethed John as he wrestled with the steering wheel and guided the van through a right hand turn at speed as the windscreen wipers battled to keep up with the driving rain.

Oliver thought for a moment, about Mikita's mentality, about her previous mission MO, and about the general direction she was going in, and he suddenly knew where she was heading.

"ARGUS," he breathed, "the ARGUS facility is a few miles away."

"What?! She'd be insane to try anything against Waller," said John, aghast at the idea.

"Thinking straight isn't her forte right now," muttered Oliver, "put your foot down Dig."

At SCPD headquarters Sergeant Kate Burrows, still recuperating from her shoulder wound and therefore confined to her desk for a few days, had been listening with rapt attention, and a slightly high pulse rate, over the last hour to reports coming in from the site of the truck heist. When the news about the dead and injured officers, both SCPD and Federal, had come through, Burrows along with all the other cops present had stood in stunned silence in communal mourning. Burrows breathed a silent prayer of thanks that Lance was not amongst the dead or injured.

Burrows wanted to phone Lance on his mobile, she rationalised that as his junior officer it wouldn't have been an unusual thing to do in the circumstances, but though she picked up her mobile phone several times she didn't dial his number. Special Agent Morgan had taken up residence in Lance's office ever since she had handed over the tip off about the truck heist and Lance had gone off to lead the SCPD response to it. Burrows glanced up to see Morgan leaning back in Lance's chair like she owned the office, the receiver of Lance's desk phone almost permanently gripped to her ear over the last hour, in between shouting for Burrows to give her an update. Burrows gritted her teeth and bit down every caustic thought that entered her head.

Burrows' mobile suddenly stated trilling and as she lifted it off her desk and saw the caller display her heart lifted as well.

"Captain, are you OK?" said Burrows trying not to sound too concerned.

"I'm fine Sergeant. I'm gonna stay at Starling General until my officers get out of surgery. How are things there?" said Lance, rubbing a hand over his weary face.

"As you'd expect, busy," said Burrows looking around her at the flurry of activity taking place in the open plan office, "Morgan has taken over your office and is asking for updates every 10minutes."

"Sounds about right," sighed Lance, "Call me if you need me, I'll be here for a couple of hours yet."

"Will do," said Burrows as the call terminated.

Burrows allowed a small tight smile to play across her mouth, and felt a sense of relief at having spoken to Lance. But was she feeling relief that a colleague was safe, or was it something more? Burrows didn't have time to investigate this thought any further as Morgan bellowed for her presence through Lance's open office door for what felt like the tenth time that hour.

Having car-jacked another vehicle, Rivers headed at speed towards Starling General Hospital. A few streets away from the rear of the hospital complex, Rivers steered the car into an alley, leapt out and started running. Breathing fast and deep he pounded the wet pavements until he entered the car park at the back of the hospital, where he slowed to a fast walk.

Rivers edged towards the dark cavernous entranceway of the hospital loading bay and slipped unnoticed through it and into the building. Slipping off his wet leather jacket he walked over to a mound of laundry bags piled up near the loading bay entrance and rummaged amongst them until he found a white lab coat, which he slipped on and buttoned up as he walked towards the connecting doorway into the main building.

Rivers picked up a stray clipboard left on a gurney in the empty basement corridor leading from the loading bay, and wiped rain water off of his face and shorn head. He then pushed open the door of the nearest fire exit and climbed up one flight of stairs, to emerge into a similarly decorated, but slightly busier corridor above. River's tried to remain as unobtrusive as possible as he walked the corridor, his eyes quickly scanning into every room with an open doorway as he passed. As he looked in through the third open doorway on his right he saw exactly what he needed and slipped into the room, closing the door after him.

Arsenal having lost sight of Rivers was still speeding through the rain drenched streets, looking frantically down each street leading off of the main highway he was on. Arsenal pressed his Bluetooth device that connected him to Felicity, but instead of hearing his colleague's professional babbling he heard her dulcet tones on her voicemail message. Roy cursed under his breath.

"Felicity where are you? Call me back as soon as you get this message," said Roy, his neck craning around looking for signs of Rivers.

Felicity's mobile rang seconds before Roy tried to call her, and she snatched at it, thinking it might be an update from Oliver and John, who were now following Mikita Jones as she tore through the streets of downtown Starling. Felicity was damn good at her job, but multi-tasking two high speed chases whilst trying to keep a wary eye on SCPD reports from the site of the truck heist, and now trying to find Rivers for Roy, all using a multitude of software systems, was proving to be a bit taxing when her nerves were stretched to their extremes; as they were every time Oliver and the team were out on a mission.

"Hello is that Miss Felicity Smoak?" the voice at the other end of the line was soothing, male, and unknown.

"Yes, who's that?" said Felicity somewhat distracted as she continued to type on her keyboard whilst balancing the phone between the side of her cheek and her shoulder blade.

"My name is Dr Scott. I'm an ER Consultant at Starling General. I'm very sorry to tell you that Mr Ray Palmer has been admitted to the ER after a serious car accident," the man's voice was calm and professional, like he'd had to make this call a hundred times before, "Mr Palmer mentioned your name, and you're listed as his next of kin in a document in his wallet."

"What, next of….? Is he OK?" said Felicity, who immediately stopped typing and gripped her mobile phone to her ear, her chest tightening. Her thoughts were a complete jumble as she tried to process the news she was hearing.

"I'd get here as soon as you can Miss. I'm sorry I can't say any more over the phone and I must get back to the ER. Please get here soon," said the strangely soothing male voice on the other end of the line as he ended the call.

"Finally!" said Roy when he got through to Felicity at the third attempt, "where have you been? Any sign of the car?

"Ray Palmer's been in a car accident, he's in the ER at Starling General, I'm heading there now," said Felicity tersely as she reached for her handbag, and threw her coat over the crook of her arm. She leant over her steel workbench and tapped at a few keys on her keyboard, and then reached for her tablet.

"What? You can't….," said Roy, his brows knitting in bewilderment as he steered Oliver's bike through the wet streets of Starling.

"I think you'll find I can," said Felicity as she power-walked towards the back of the Arrow cave talking to Roy using her Bluetooth earpiece, "I'm monitoring CCTV and traffic cameras on my tablet. The last sighting of the car was about two blocks from your current location. If I get anything I'll let you know straight away. Gotta go."

Felicity ended the call to Roy and emerged out into the cool night air through the secret side door to the Foundry and into the pouring rain and ran down a dark side alley at the back of the disused Foundry complex to where she had parked her car.

After biting down another curse, and turning the bike in the direction of Rivers' last known location, Roy immediately called Oliver and updated him about Ray Palmer's accident and Felicity's sudden flight to Starling General Hospital.

Oliver's gut feeling, though mixed with a pang of jealousy and a great surge of concern for Felicity's welfare, told him that something was not right with the sudden turn of events.

"Get over to Starling General now," said Oliver, "Don't let Felicity out of your sight."

"What about Rivers?" said Roy, slightly frustrated that his pursuit of Rivers was being curtailed.

"Felicity is our first priority, we'll deal with him later," said Oliver as John swerved the van into a tight left hand turn two blocks away from ARGUS HQ.

Rivers was upon Felicity before she realised she was in any danger, before she could even enter the hospital, walking from the car park at the rear of the building. She desperately struggled in his grip, trying to wrestle herself free of him, to kick, to punch, to gain any purchase on her assailant, but to no avail. She knew she had to try and shout for help but Rivers had a hand clamped across her lower face, making it hard for her to breathe, as he dragged her further back into the shadows between the edge of the car park and the brick wall running the length of the rear of the hospital goods delivery yard.

Rivers had already broken into a delivery van parked adjacent to the delivery good entrance, and left its rear doors ajar, before he had hidden in the dark shadows of the loading bay waiting for Felicity to arrive at the hospital. Rivers, gripping a tight hold of Miss Smoak thumped into the side of the hijacked vehicle and slid alongside it towards its rear. He flipped Felicity around suddenly and slapped a hand across the side of her face and head, causing a small spurt of blood to emerge from her lip, disorientating her. Her pain and bewilderment leant him the few seconds he needed to open the rear door of the van and manhandle her inside, following after her and then slamming the door shut from the inside.

Laurel Lance was just locking her car door in the car park at Starling General Hospital when a small noise and movement in the dark to her left caught her eye. Laurel saw what looked like a man dragging a woman towards the back of a van. Laurel started walking forwards, and as she did so she saw the woman had blonde hair in a ponytail and was wearing glasses…..Felicity?

"Hey!" she shouted.

Inside the van Felicity raised as much of a shout for help as she was able to through a dry throat, and was greeted with a firm punch to the stomach from Rivers, which winded her, forcing her to bend forwards on her knees in the back of the van. Rivers roughly pushed her over on to her side on the floor of the van and quickly and efficiently reached for some cord and secured her hands tightly behind her back. Felicity winced at the pain it caused.

Felicity's anger at her situation battled with her fear as Rivers loomed over her in the darkened confines of the van. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes as she felt the futility of her situation and her sense of vulnerability as Rivers leaned down close to her face and jabbed a finger towards her.

"We're going for a little drive," he hissed menacingly, "if you try anything, I will make you scream."

Rivers stared at Felicity for a couple of seconds, before raising himself up on to his feet and manoeuvring the few steps through to the driver's seat at the front of the vehicle. Rivers reached inside his jacket, withdrew a handgun, and placed it on the passenger seat to his right. He turned the key in the van's ignition and steered the vehicle towards the exit of the hospital car park. As the vehicle moved off he saw a woman running towards the van.

Roy steered Oliver's bike in through the entrance of the car park at Starling General Hospital and immediately saw a woman running across the car park. As he accelerated towards her he realised it was Laurel, and that she was running after a delivery van heading in his direction. The van suddenly started to accelerate and Roy had to swerve violently to avoid a collision. Roy steered the bike over to where Laurel was standing, breathing heavily. Before Roy could ask her anything, Laurel was pointing towards the receding van.

"He's got Felicity!" yelled Laurel.

Roy wrenched at the bike's accelerator handle and tore off in the direction of the delivery van.

As the vehicle she was trapped inside sped through the streets of Starling City, Felicity tried to stop her emotions from overwhelming her. She had to focus, to calm her frantic nerves and beating heart, and try to figure out a way of getting free or getting word to Roy, John or Oliver.

 **Chapter Nine**

Roy sped on Oliver's motorcycle through the darkened rain-drenched streets of Starling, this time giving less thought to protecting bystanders as he gradually kept increasing his speed; forcing them to swerve out of his way. The storm still rumbled overhead, with occasional lightning flashes and rolling bursts of thunder, but the rain had reduced from its torrential downpour to a steady drizzle. Roy's eyes narrowed against the driving force of the rain hitting his face, his sole focus was the street before him, and keeping the delivery van in his sights; there was no way he was going to let Rivers get away this time.

Oliver was right; Mikita Jones destination had been ARGUS HQ. As John and Oliver stepped out of the black Team Arrow van outside the non-descript concrete and glass entrance way to the top secret facility, they could see the stolen SCPD patrol car that Jones had been driving parked at an angle outside the entrance, and they could see the results of Mikita's unexpected and violent arrival as two security guards lay dead on the pavement. Oliver and John could hear the sound of gunfire inside. They glanced at each other and then ran in through the entranceway as a small crowd of ARGUS workers were being ushered out of the building by security staff.

John was reaching for his mobile phone as they ran inside, calling Lyla. As the call was connected John could hear semi-automatic gunfire from the other end of the line.

"Lyla!" shouted John above the noise of the alarm sounding in the foyer, "I'm downstairs, where are you?!"

"Fourth floor! Jones has got Waller. She's…ugh," Lyla's voice was cut short by a grunt of agony and the line suddenly went dead.

"Lyla!" yelled John, who receiving no answer, gritted his teeth and pocketed his phone, "Fourth floor. Jones has got Waller."

Oliver gripped his compound bow in his right hand and raced for the emergency stairwell, with John hard on his heels.

Laurel ran towards her car the moment that Arsenal sped away from her on his motorcycle, chasing after the stolen delivery van driven by Rivers. Within less than a minute Laurel was speeding diagonally across the car park towards the exit, giving chase herself, with no thought to her own safety, or what the combined warnings of her father, Ted Grant or Oliver Queen would no doubt be in this situation. All she knew was that she had to help.

Oliver was approaching the fourth floor inside the emergency stairwell when the call came through from Roy telling him Rivers had kidnapped Felicity at Starling General. Oliver suddenly stopped climbing the stairs and gripped hold of the bannister with such force he almost wrenched it from its mooring bolts.

"What is it?" said John catching him up and seeing the serious expression on Oliver's face.

"Rivers took Felicity," said Oliver in a hard tone, looking at John. "Roy, do not lose sight of her."

"Don't worry, I won't," said Roy as he ended the call.

Oliver could feel a cold hand, like ice, squeezing his heart in his chest. He knew he had to stay where he was, he had to help Lyla and Waller and stop Mikita Jones, but he wanted desperately to leave and go after Felicity. As he ascended the last flight of stairs leading to the stairwell door exiting on to the fourth floor, his emotions were churning. As John reached out and slowly opened the door, Oliver bit down his feelings, breathed steadily, and with his bow stretched taut, and an arrow loaded and ready to fire, he regained his hard-edged focus and stepped through the doorway into the chaos beyond.

Roy was only concerned with what was in front of him, Rivers, not what was behind him, so Roy was entirely surprised to glance once in his rear view mirror to see a car giving chase at speed. Roy sighed loudly when he realised it was being driven by Laurel Lance. Roy didn't have time to stop and talk to Laurel so he hoped that she would not be able to keep up with him and would eventually give up. It was a wild hope.

Rivers drove towards the Glades, and Roy followed, with Laurel bringing up the rear. After several minutes, Rivers slowed the delivery van down and began taking a variety of right and left turns through a semi-derelict area. Roy realised with gut-wrenching certainty that he knew where Rivers was heading; the warehouse in the Glades where Felicity had helped rescued Oliver Queen several weeks ago, where she had first got in Rivers way.

Roy glanced at his rear view mirror again and saw that Laurel was still behind him, but closer. Now that Rivers, and therefore Roy's, speed had been reduced she had managed to gain more ground on them both. Rivers took the almost predestined right hand turn on to the narrow street that led to the warehouse which had been badly damaged by the explosion caused in the aftermath of Oliver's rescue. Roy slowed down the bike and followed the van about halfway down the street, hugging the shadows of the buildings lining its route. He stopped the bike sixty feet from the warehouse and watched as Rivers parked the van, and ran around to open its rear doors and drag Felicity out. Gripping her mouth with one hand, and bodily lifting her off the ground with his strong arm Rivers headed towards the warehouse.

On the fourth floor of ARGUS HQ water poured from the sprinkler system in the ceiling, and an alarm whooped a continuous warning to leave the building. Those who could be evacuated had already deserted the floor. A few ARGUS agents lay dead or badly injured in various parts of the open plan office space after coming up short against Mikita Jones's sharpshooting skills. A variety of LED display screens smoked and fizzed with electrical sparks, their glass cracked by bullets, and report papers littered the floor.

Oliver and John, their weapons drawn, paced around the floor, looking for Jones. Suddenly John spotted Lyla, slumped on the floor behind a desk, a wound high up on her shoulder pouring with blood. John raced over to crouch by her, Oliver walked over to stand behind John, still scanning the room, his bow string pulled semi-taut. As John grabbed hold of a scarf hanging over a nearby chair and balled it up to place over Lyla's shoulder wound, she looked up at Oliver.

"She's got Waller, took her up the stairwell. The elevators are on lock down, my guess is she's heading for…," said Lyla, gasping with every other word, each syllable taking an effort to enunciate.

"The roof," said Oliver with grim finality. Oliver weighed up his options, and decided on his course of action.

"Dig stay with Lyla, call for help," said Oliver.

"Oliver you can't go up there alone," said Diggle, but he got no reply as Oliver had already started jogging back towards the entrance to the stairwell.

Laurel parked her car at the opposite end of the street to the warehouse. She tore off her tan coloured belted raincoat and fetched her black leather Canary jacket, gloves and fighting stick from the boot of her car and ran towards Roy, who was standing by his motorcycle.

"Go home Laurel," said Roy harshly as she approached.

"I can help," said Laurel firmly, leaning her metal stick against the bike and slipping on the jacket and gloves.

"You know what Oliver would say," said Roy, turning to walk away from her, but she sped up and got in front of him.

"Oliver isn't here right now. You are, on your own. I can help," said Laurel with even more determination, her eyes blazing with spirit.

Roy sighed heavily. I haven't got time for a well-trodden argument with Laurel Lance, ace legal prosecutor right now, he thought, I have to save Felicity and stop Rivers.

"You and I are going to have words later," said Roy, resignedly as he started jogging towards the warehouse, Laurel running alongside him.

By the time that Oliver stepped out on to the roof of ARGUS HQ and located Mikita Jones he had little doubt that she had spiralled beyond any thought of compromise.

Jones stood by the side of Amanda Waller by the edge of the rooftop, which was bounded on all sides by a four foot high brick and concrete wall. Waller's hands were tied tightly in front of her by a thin plastic band, which pulled tighter with every movement she made to free herself. Jones held a hand gun at her side, and in the other hand held a short metal tube, like a pen, her thumb positioned over the button at its top – a button that would send a signal to the radio frequency device planted in the bomb vest that Waller was currently wearing.

Oliver stealthily approached to within twenty feet of the two women, his bow pulled tight and an arrow aimed at Jones. Waller stood still, her face impassive as ever, as a trickle of blood dripped down the side of her face from a blow she'd received to the temple.

"You took your time," said Waller coolly, and received another blow to the head from the side of Jones's gun. Waller bent forward and winced in pain.

"You speak when you're spoken to," said Jones leaning down stare at Waller's face before pulling her violently upright.

"Mikita, let her go," said Oliver calmly, his bow still aimed at Jones.

"Does the vigilante stop to negotiate now?" said Mikita, "I thought you just shot people full of arrows and walked away."

"Things change," muttered Oliver, "people change."

"Not everyone!" barked Mikita, who showed a flash of anger before biting back her emotions and then smiling.

Oliver knew he had limited options. Waller was too close to the edge of the rooftop, and he was unsure what distance Jones had to be from Waller to disrupt the firing command to the bomb vest. A sudden flash of lightning lit up the roof top as the rain started to fall heavily again, and the clouds rumbled with thunder. Rain water washed some of the blood down Waller's face and the jacket of her business suit started to darken as the water soaked into it.

"It's quite a dramatic ending for you Amanda," trilled Jones, holding out her arms and looking up at the night sky. Oliver took a couple of steps forward, and Jones's head immediately snapped down to look at him.

"Why would you want to save her?" said Mikita, her brows furrowing in mystery. "She's not worth saving. She took my life away without even a second thought. She'll do the same to you or anyone you love."

"I know," said Oliver in a cool tone, keeping his eyes on Jones' face. Oliver's past history with Waller flashed in jagged brief flash backs in his mind. There was some sense to what the woman was saying. He had intimate knowledge of the extent to which Waller was willing to go in the pursuit of her goals. Mikita looked at Oliver, as if noticing something new about him, as if sensing the thoughts he was having.

"You're just like me," said Mikita.

"I don't think so," said Oliver firmly.

"Yes, we're tools for people like her. Useful for their dirty little jobs, and then expendable when it all gets a little too complicated."

Knowing Mikita's back story, Oliver had some sympathy with her situation. He had been at the receiving end of a rough ride from Amanda Waller a few years back. And on more than one occasion he'd had murderous thoughts about her, only to be pulled back from action by his inherent and ingrained sense of justice. The violent life he led, that Waller in part introduced him to, had served him well and kept him alive. But recently he had stopped being a vigilante, stopped seeking revenge without mercy; he had found another way. If there was a chance to pull Mikita Jones back from the edge of the abyss that he had almost fallen into, he had to try and take it.

Arsenal approached the side door fire exit to the warehouse cautiously. With Laurel close behind him, they hugged the concrete wall of the building, Arsenal pulling his bow string half-taut, ready for any sudden attack by Rivers. Ideally in this situation Roy would normally call Felicity for tech support, but sadly that wasn't an option. He and Laurel would have to enter the building "blind", so surprise was their only option to throw Rivers off guard long enough in order to try and take him out and save Felicity.

From his recollection, the warehouse had been a rectangular structure, with a large open plan central storage area, and a walkway above, with a few empty concrete cellar type rooms towards its rear. Half the building was destroyed; the result of an explosive incendiary device, so using the roof would not be an option. Roy decided that their best option was to spilt up and attack Rivers from opposite sides of the building. Roy outlined a brief plan to Laurel and opted to take the other side of the building. He handed Laurel one of his explosive arrow heads and quickly showed her how to activate it.

"Wait," said Laurel, gripping on to Roy's leather clad arm as he was about to head off, "how will I know when you've launched your attack?"

"Just listen out, you'll know," said Roy before he started running back along the wall of the building and slipped into the darkness on the right.

Less than two minutes later Laurel heard the sound of an explosion and heard a scream from within the building. She wrenched open the metal fire exit door and gripping her fighting stick charged into the building. Her eyes quickly scanned the room as she charged forward and threw herself behind a large stack of crates. Another explosion went off, the sound echoing around the hollow shell of the building. Laurel stuck her head around the side of the crates and could see Arsenal on the other side of the room standing twenty feet away from Rivers, who was gripping a tight hold of Felicity and holding the nozzle of his handgun firmly against her body.

Laurel threw the timed arrow head explosive off to her right. As it detonated, distracting Rivers and Arsenal, she kept herself hidden behind any available cover, crates, a stack of tyres, and a small collection of machinery, as she made a quick crouching run along to the left until she was behind Rivers. Arsenal kept his eyes firmly focussed on Rivers, his bow aimed at his head, but he saw through his peripheral vision that Laurel had managed to manoeuvre herself into the right position.

"Let her go Rivers," said Roy, his voice camouflage software embedded in his jacket making his tone sound deep and threatening, "I won't ask again."

Rivers was mad as hell and slightly disorientated from the explosive arrows that had detonated close to him when Arsenal first stormed into the warehouse; his ears rang and his vision was slightly blurred. His strength however was not affected and Felicity was making no headway in trying to escape from his clutches; she had already received a punch for her troubles that had winded her badly. Her face still ached from the slap Rivers had given her before he pushed her into the delivery van, and she could taste blood in her mouth.

True to his word Arsenal bravely stepped forward two paces and pulled the bow string to its maximum, ready to fire.

"You fire that thing at me, she dies hood boy," growled Rivers as he thrust his handgun into Felicity's temple.

Laurel's first swing of her metal stick across Rivers back forced him forwards and his grip loosened on Felicity. The blonde IT girl stamped her foot down on Rivers boot as hard as she could and brought her elbow back forcefully into his side. Finally free of his grip she ran towards Arsenal. Rivers coughed and wheeled around, his gun aiming at head height towards his surprise attacker. Laurel swiped the end of the stick towards Rivers midriff, and then wheeled it around in her hands to bring it crashing down across the side of his head. Rivers fired wildly, the bullet ricocheting off of the concrete floor, causing Laurel to spin off to the left. As Rivers saw her move he levelled his gun at her and made to fire again, but an arrow tore through his extended arm and he screamed in agony dropping the gun and dropping to his knees.

Laurel stepped over to the gun and picked it up, flipped it over in her hand, and using the barrel as a grip she swiped the handle of the gun across Rivers jaw, splitting his lip.

"Bitch," spat Rivers, sending a globule of blood to the floor near Laurel's feet.

Arsenal strode over to Laurel and placed a hand over Laurel's, as she started to raise her hand holding the gun again. Through his eye mask he gave her a look that urged caution and restraint.

"Felicity, call the Captain, tell him we have a gift for him" said Roy addressing his friend behind him, yet still looking at Laurel, "and as for you. Thank you. Now go home."

Another lightning flash and a massive crack of thunder disguised John Diggle's appearance on to the rooftop of ARGUS HQ.

Having taken Lyla down to the foyer where they were met by recently arrived paramedics, John had assured himself that Lyla was in safe and good hands, and had raced towards the stairwell and up to the rooftop level to help Oliver in any way he could. Standing behind the metal door leading on to the roof, Diggle regulated his breathing from his race up the stairs, gripped his Glock handgun in his hand and edged the door open a crack.

With caution and using the bulky square air con units jutting out from the rooftop as cover, Diggle edged closer to the voices he could hear at the far end of the rooftop. Waller was the first to see John, though she didn't betray his presence, she merely looked at Oliver and winked with her right eye. It was an unsettling gesture from Waller, but one that Oliver knew the meaning of. The situation was explosive, so the play from here would have to be measured. Waller however didn't know the meaning of the word measured.

Before Oliver could stop her Waller stepped forward and squarely addressed Jones.

"He is like you. He's a tool I have used in the past and I will use him again. I will use any and all methods, no matter how extreme, to keep this country safe. Lewis agreed with me on that," said Waller in her monotone calmness.

Jones faced coloured and her eyes blazed as she turned to look at Waller, her arm raised to bring her handgun crashing down on Waller's head again; the mention of her dead husband's name causing her blood to boil.

"Amanda, shut up!" bellowed Oliver, who fired his arrow and sent Jones' handgun spinning over the edge of the rooftop.

John then emerged from his hiding place and fired a shot high into Jones' shoulder, knocking her backwards and sending the pen-like metal firing pin skittling across the wet concrete surface of the rooftop. Mikita righted herself, whipped a hand behind her back, pulled another gun out from her back holster and fired shots in both Oliver's and John's direction, sending them tumbling in opposite directions to find cover.

Jones fired until she ran out of bullets, and then started to reach into a trouser leg of her combat trousers for the extra ammo clips she had stored there. John leapt to his feet and charged at Jones, knocking her over with a rugby tackle. Jones landed two good punches on Diggle, who traded her one back as they both struggled to their feet, before she brought an elbow crashing into his lower stomach and followed through with a hefty kick across the face. Searching the ground she saw the firing pin lying nearby and staggered over to it.

Oliver raced over to Waller, and used an arrow head to free her wrists, before checking over the bomb vest and starting to assist her out of it.

"Oliver!" yelled John.

Everything happened at once and almost in slow motion. Jones reached down to pick up the firing pin as Oliver swivelled his head to look at John, who was pointing in Jones' direction. Waller was almost out of the bomb vest as Jones depressed the firing pin and a series of lights started glowing on it. Oliver wrenched it from Waller's hands and flung it with all of his might off of the roof, before he bent down, picked up his bow, ripped an explosive tipped arrow from his quiver, loaded it, and fired it in the direction of the bomb vest which was falling towards the ground.

The shock wave from the resulting explosion blew everyone standing on the roof to its concrete floor. Diggle, who was already on the floor, threw his hands over his head in a reflexive defensive move.

There was a pause, where the only sound was the sky rumbling above and the rain slapping down on the surface of the roof, before Oliver leapt to his feet and raced over to the edge of the rooftop. A few stunned faces looked back up at him, but thankfully there was no major damage below. Oliver turned just as Diggle was struggling to his feet. Jones lay on her back, winded from the fall and the wound high on her shoulder. Waller stepped over to where John's gun had fallen, picked it up, walked past John and over to Mikita Jones and fired two shots into her.

"Amanda!" yelled Oliver.

"What the hell!" yelled John.

Before either man could do anything else, a small coterie of suited ARGUS agents wearing protective vests, arrived on the roof, their guns drawn and pointed in the direction of Oliver and John. Waller sauntered over to them.

"Those two can go. Clear that up," she said, tipping her head in the direction of the body of Mikita Jones.

Oliver gritted his teeth and held down a curse. Then suddenly he said "Felicity" and started running towards the roof top exit, with John hard on his heels.

As John was slamming a foot on the accelerator pedal in the Team Arrow van, the call came through from Roy to say that Felicity was safe.

Just over an hour later Team Arrow was assembled back in the basement below the Foundry. As they did after every mission, they debriefed in their routine ways. John checked their equipment and weapons cache, and Oliver and Roy got changed out of their suits in between pacing the room and asking Felicity for post-mission updates.

Rivers was heading back to Iron Heights prison under armed guard, Lyla's bullet wound was less serious than thought and she was already stitched up and would soon be heading home, the carnage on I-5 was slowly being photographed and catalogued by Morgan's federal team, and Lance was rightfully sitting back at his desk at SCPD HQ in his padded leather chair debriefing Special Agent Morgan who was sitting awkwardly on the hardwood guest chair in the office.

Felicity normally took it in turns to assess her male colleagues for injury and patched them up as best she could, but this evening after having done this, it was her turn to get some first aid treatment. Leaning against her steel workstation, Felicity stood patiently whilst Oliver dabbed at the side of her mouth with a stinging antiseptic lotion. She and Oliver shared a warm look.

"Don't say it. I know you want to," whispered Felicity, their faces inches apart as Oliver finished dabbing at her lip with the swab.

"You could have been hurt," breathed Oliver, looking directly in her eyes.

"But I wasn't, much," said Felicity, reaching out to hold Oliver's hand, "and dwelling on what did or didn't happen isn't going to help. I know I reacted without thinking, without checking."

"The life I lead is dangerous. I'm careful, I train, but it's my choice. You…," started Oliver before he was cut short by Felicity, who levered herself away from the workbench to stand tall, her chin jutting upwards, her look determined.

"It's my choice too. We can't live our lives in fear of what might or might not happen, holding people at arm's length, frightened to get too close to them in case we hurt them. That's not living Oliver."

"Seize the moment," said Oliver, thinking back to their date on the roof and what it had led to.

"Every day," said Felicity quietly but assuredly, gripping Oliver's hand in hers.

"Every day?" said Oliver, raising an eyebrow and giving Felicity a knowing look edged with humour.

Knowing exactly what Oliver was implying, Felicity raised an eyebrow at him in reply, a small smirk playing across her lips as she leant against him and looked up into his face, looking down into hers.

"I do hope so," she breathed.

Laurel had left the warehouse, and ran back up the narrow street to her car, and was at least two blocks away before the first squad car arrived at the scene of Felicity's rescue. Laurel could feel her heart beating and her veins pulsing with the adrenaline kicking through her system. Having initially steered the car in the direction of her apartment, she suddenly threw a left hand turn and increased her speed, heading for the Glades.

Ted Grant's apartment was in a small complex a few blocks away from his Wildcat Gym. Laurel had been there once or twice before after a training session, to eat a post-work out meal. There had been an obvious attraction between them for some time, but neither had made any move to take the matter further, so they had sat and eaten and made small talk and then said goodnight, and that had been the end of it.

Even as Laurel was standing outside Ted's apartment ten minutes later, her hand raised ready to knock on his door, she was wondering if she should be there. Laurel's emotions were conflicted. Did she really like this man, or was she here because she was still pumped up from her recent fight with Rivers and Ted was a useful way to work off some remaining excess energy?

Ted must have heard something in the corridor outside his apartment door, for before Laurel had a chance to decide whether she was going to knock or not, the door was suddenly opened. Laurel took one look at him and smiled. Ted stepped back from the doorway and waved a welcoming arm inviting her inside.

The next day, Quentin Lance phoned his daughter Laurel and arranged to meet her at his favourite coffee shop, Java's. Lance still hadn't received a call or a text from Sara even though he had left her a message after he had seen her at Iron Heights; unaware that the person in black leather that he had seen had been Laurel. Lance wanted to check in with his eldest daughter anyway, and thought he would ask her if she'd had any word from Sara; the girls had always been as thick as thieves and would always keep in contact with each other.

As Lance stepped inside Java's he caught sight of Sergeant Kate Burrows sitting at a table by herself over on the left-hand side by the window, the sports pages of the local newspaper in front of her. Kate seemed to sense that someone was looking at her and glanced over towards the front door of Java's to see Captain Lance standing there and giving her a brief nod.

"Hey, how are you? How's the arm?" said Lance as he arrived by Burrows side.

"Good, I'll be fully operational by tomorrow," said Kate, folding her newspaper and dropping it on the table.

"Good…..good," said Lance, realising he was repeating himself, feeling a little awkward.

"Hey thanks for the tip about this place. I like it," said Burrows, glancing around the room.

"Yeah, well, maybe I'll stand you a coffee sometime," said Lance.

"I'll take you up on that if Morgan ever gives me fifteen minutes to myself," said Kate checking her wrist watch, "speaking of which I better get back and finish that report for her."

"I know she's hard on you, well on everyone actually, but she does get results," said Lance, "I mean she came through with the information about the truck heist. Saved a lot of lives."

"Your opinion has softened on her?" said Kate, standing up and looking at Lance, curiosity and something akin to disappointment in her tone.

"I have no idea what Morgan's angle is," sighed Lance, "unless we find something we can't act on it, not without firm evidence."

Burrows nodded her head briefly, acceding to Lance's reasoning, but she couldn't shake the unassailable feeling that Morgan was playing a game with everyone, including Lance. Burrows remembered the tender moment she had witnessed at Starling General with Lance leaning over Morgan's bedside; she felt warm and confused, and knew she needed some air.

"Are you OK?" said Lance with concern, "you look a little flushed."

"I'm fine, I should get back," said Burrows dully scooping up her paper, looking like she didn't want to head back to work.

"Hey let me buy you that coffee. I'll call Morgan and tell her she can wait for that report," said Lance, reaching for his mobile phone.

"No don't," said Kate humorously, "she'll think we're working in cahoots or something."

"Cahoots?!" said Lance, humour in his eyes, "who uses that expression!"

The two of them stood looking at each other, smiles on their mouths and warm creases around their eyes. There it was again; the spark of something interesting between them, and both could feel it. No mention of rank or professional responsibilities, just two people sharing a positively charged moment of ease and understanding.

"Hey," said Laurel Lance as she approached her father.

Neither Quentin nor Kate had noticed Laurel enter the coffee shop. And just as soon as the "moment" began, it ended, with Lance looking at his daughter, then at Burrows, and then brief but friendly hello's and goodbye's passing between them all; and then Burrows was walking out of Java's and back to the precinct.

"You seem very…comfortable with each other. What happened to I'm her boss?" said Laurel a mischievous glint in her eye.

"Stop it," said her father, the look in his eye not as firm as the tone in his voice.

Laurel smiled.

Lyla Michaels upon discharge from Starling General Hospital the night before had been ordered by Waller to head straight home and to file her report the following morning. Rising very early the next day Lyla had slipped out of the apartment before Diggle was awake and had gone to work as normal at ARGUS HQ. Waller surprised her by approaching her at her desk and told her she should take an immediate 24hour leave break. That wasn't ARGUS policy, but Lyla wasn't going to argue with her boss, and once the report was filed she headed back to her apartment to find John feeding Sara her breakfast. Lyla updated her partner about Waller's sudden gesture.

"That's generous. Perhaps that knock on the head she received might have done her some good," muttered John sarcastically, not looking at Lyla as he wiped Sara's mouth and lifted her out of her high chair, depositing her in the playpen in the kitchen.

"You're angry with me," said Lyla sighing, conscious that John and she had barely talked last night about what had happened at ARGUS, and about the revelations about Mikita Jones that Lyla had begrudgingly given to Team Arrow over the phone.

"No, I'm not. I just don't like being left out in the cold Lyla. No wait hear me out. You think you're protecting me, us, by keeping your work away from home. I get that. But you and I live with secrets every day. We _have_ to share them with each other, or we drown under the weight of them."

Lyla sighed, hesitant to say anything, yet wanting to say so much. It was as if Diggle was asking the impossible of her, her loyalties placed, and stretched, between him and Waller and ARGUS.

"I'm not asking you to break your code or your loyalty to your job or your team, I'm saying there are gonna be times when your work and mine coincide. So….," said John taking a breath.

"You show me yours and I'll show you mine?" said Lyla, smirk playing on her lips.

"Well I wasn't gonna put it quite like that, but yeah," smiled John.

Lyla walked over to John and lifted her arms up and around the back of his broad shoulders. John scooped his arms around Lyla's waist and pulled her into him.

Finding it difficult to sleep, Roy had risen early the next morning and walked to the diner at the end of his street and had breakfast. It was too early to head to the Arrow cave for training, so Roy found himself heading in the direction of Starling General Hospital.

Up on the ICU floor, one of the nurses who had seen him a few times nodded kindly towards him in greeting as he entered Peter Corvelli's room. As Roy hovered by the side of Peter's bed, the nurse slipped into the room.

"We've reduced the medication slightly. It's still early days but the doctors are hopeful they might be able to lift the induced coma in the next 24 hours," said the nurse gently. Roy thanked her as a colleague stepped into the room and called her away.

Roy took a seat by the side of Peter's bed and watched the young man's chest rising and falling at a steady rate. It may have been his imagination, but Roy thought he saw more colour in Peter Corvelli's face.

By mid-afternoon of that day, the effects of the drama of the night before were starting to tell on Felicity Smoak, and she yawned loudly, and then held her hand up to the side of her mouth where Rivers had split her lip. Felicity stood up from her desk chair and gently arched her back. There were no more meetings scheduled in her diary for the rest of the afternoon, and no pressing reports to compile for the next day, so she reasoned that a the Vice-President of a Fortune 500 company she was well within her rights to bunk off work a couple of hours early.

Having left instructions with her Executive Assistant about when, and if, she could be contacted, and having cleared the plan with Ray Palmer, who was so totally immersed in some technical project in his office that he would have probably said yes to anything she asked, Felicity grabbed her coat and handbag and headed for the elevator.

As Felicity was buttoning up her coat as she crossed the marble floored foyer of the Palmer Technology Building she almost ran straight into Oliver.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey," she said.

"Are you off to a meeting or something?" said Oliver, a quick frown playing across his forehead.

"No, I decided to leave early," said Felicity, "why are you here?"

"I was coming to see you," said Oliver smoothly, "to find out if you could leave early."

"Oh," said Felicity archly, "what a coincidence."

Oliver gently smiled at Felicity, and then stepped to the side of her and hooked out his arm for Felicity to slip her arm through.

"Where are we going?" said Felicity as they walked arm in arm towards the large glass exit doors of the building.

"You'll see," said Oliver calmly.

Fifteen minutes later, after hailing a cab, Oliver and Felicity disembarked from the vehicle outside the hotel on 3rd and Franklin where they had recently enjoyed their rooftop date.

"You are part bat," muttered Felicity under her breath as she followed Oliver towards the steps of the hotel, assuming they were heading for another rooftop adventure. This time however instead of walking past the entrance of the hotel to head around the back of the building Oliver, holding Felicity's hand, led her up the steps of the hotel entrance and in to the lobby.

"Oh, we're not using the fire exit stairs again, shame," said Felicity with mock disappointment.

"Wait here," said Oliver pointedly as he headed over to the Reception Desk. Less than two minutes later he returned holding a key, which he placed in Felicity's hand.

"You can't afford this," said Felicity, feeling slightly flustered as she held the key in her hand.

"I can't, but Waller can, and she owes me a favour. More than one actually," said Oliver moving to stand close to Felicity.

"Well, I'm willing to put my total dislike for the woman to one side on this occasion, if you are," said Felicity raising an eyebrow and smirking at Oliver.

"I am," said Oliver looking warmly at Felicity, "let's go and seize a moment."

 **The End**


End file.
